Teacher's Pet
by harrypotterfangirl2010
Summary: Hey guys, new story! Starts in 1990, where Lupin is teaching and Tonks is in seventh year.  Three years before his first canon appearance.  Follows through PoA, OofP, HPB and DH. My usual angst and smut. And obviously, I don't own anything - enjoy.
1. Chapter 1

**Slightly AU; In canon, Lupin is first introduced in 1993, when Harry's in third year. This is set in 1990, when Tonks is in seventh. **

"Remus, good to see you, come in," Andromeda Tonks welcomed Remus Lupin, who she had first gotten to know when she had been Head Girl at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and he had been a lowly first-year. They had been in what were largely fiercely rivalling Houses, although Andromeda had been somewhat misplaced in Slytherin and mostly preferred hanging out with her younger cousin Sirius and his friends in Gryffindor. Because of that, she had been one of just six people who had known that he was a werewolf (eight now, including her husband and daughter). It hadn't bothered her in the slightest. He had been a caring, thoughtful boy who took great pains not to expose anyone to the darker side of him, and that was a hell of a lot more than most people tried to do – full-humans who ought to have been able to help themselves. Her own sister Bellatrix for example, who was currently rotting in Azkaban for various offenses, Bellatrix had been considered cruel even for a Death Eater, her career culminating in the mind-frying torture of a gifted and well-liked Auror and his wife, effectively leaving their son an orphan.

Compared to Bellatrix, Lupin was a saint, and not one that she was going to refuse entry into her home for being a werewolf.

Lupin entered the house. "Nice place," he said, a little enviously. The fear and discrimination directed towards werewolves and other half-breeds meant that it was very difficult for him to get a job and subsequently afford a nice place like that.

"Nothing I really earned," Andromeda admitted. "Dad's will was such that it couldn't be broken. Though I'm sure if he were alive, he'd take Bellatrix over me."

"Then he's an idiot."

Andromeda smiled at what was Lupin's obvious sincerity. He would never have been admitted in her father's house, but he was a much greater calibre of man than she would have known there. "What brings you here?" she asked.

"I wanted to talk to you and Dora, actually," he said. Andromeda led Lupin into the living room and called her daughter Nymphadora, who rarely answered to anything but her last name. Her parents and Lupin were among the few exceptions, and even they were only allowed to call her Dora.

Tonks came into the room wearing, as usual, torn jeans and a tight white t-shirt featuring the Weird Sisters. "Remus!" she said, smiling to see him. He was the only one of her parent's friends whose company she enjoyed.

"You look good," he said, always pleased to see her. She was a sweet girl he'd known from babyhood and very mature for her age. He suspected part of it was because being a metamorphmagus – a shape-shifter of sorts – had taught her a lot of lessons about how many users there were out there – so many boys who wanted to be with her only because she could be any fantasy – and the value of true friendship. "I'm glad you're here so I don't have to say it twice. I've been offered the position of Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher at Hogwarts."

Tonks beamed. "Oooh, Remus, that's great!" she enthused. "It'll be so good to have a mate as a teacher. All the DADA professors we've had so far have sucked."

"That's why I came to talk to you before I accepted. I can't be your friend at Hogwarts, Dora. And you can't say anything about my – er – condition."

"You mean being a werewolf?" she asked, completely upfront, as always.

"Yes, I mean being a werewolf. The staff knows, of course, but Dumbledore agrees that parents just won't understand so it's best not to let them or the students know, except you and your folks, of course. I'll understand if you think you can't keep a secret, or if you don't like the idea of me teaching her, Andy, but I thought I'd save myself the trouble and clear it with you guys first."

"Of course it's doable, Remus," Andromeda said. About bloody time he had a decent job, too, she thought. "Dora?" she asked pointedly.

"Yes, of course – I won't say anything – or treat you like a friend – if you don't want me to."

"I appreciate that. And we can still be friends – just not while I'm trying to be your Professor." Tonks smiled winningly at that. "So brace me. Tell me anything I should be wary of."

"There's a Malfoy in our year – one of Uncle Lucius's nephews," Tonks said, making a face. Though Richard Malfoy shared his uncle's opinion about anyone who was less than a pure-blood, he had a fascination with the girl he referred to as his 'cousin' for the way she could change her appearance at will. As if Tonks wasn't by this point excellent at deflecting unwanted male attention. She had known from an early age that there would be a never-ending line of men who wanted her because she could be any fantasy and not for her. "And mum never believed that Snape really turned good. He teaches Potions."

"I heard," Lupin said dryly. Dumbledore didn't trust Snape with the position he _really_ wanted – the one he was going to teach himself. He had his own history with Severus Snape; the man had been arch-enemies with two of his best friends, James Potter and Sirius Black, and Lupin doubted that the fact James was dead and Sirius in prison would soften Snape's attitude towards him; Snape had born a grudge not only against James and Sirius but Lupin and another friend, Peter Pettigrew – now dead – and was unlikely to have let it go. "I can deal with Snape."

"He doesn't like anyone who's not in Slytherin," Tonks said. "Gave me a totally filthy look when I didn't end up there, as if I'd want to go. Besides, they don't take half-bloods."

"Tell that to Snape – his dad's a muggle," Lupin said. Tonks chortled gleefully at that information. "Don't go spreading that around, please. I'm one of the few people who know that so he'll trace it back to me easily enough if it gets back to him. Though you're right, the Hat tends not to sort half-bloods into Slytherin. How Snape thought Lily Evans would get in, I'm not sure. I would have been floored if you'd gone anywhere _but_ Hufflepuff, to be honest." Her dad was a muggle-born wizard who had been sorted into Hufflepuff, and since students tended to be sorted by families and Andromeda had been a – somewhat misplaced – Slytherin, it was natural for Tonks to end up in the same house as her father.

He ended up staying for dinner and reluctantly Appirated back to his own apartment in the early hours of the morning. "Poor man, he must be so lonely," Andromeda mused. "He took James and Peter's deaths so badly. And Sirius..." It was hard to tell what had been worse, the deaths of two of his best friends or the fact that the third was responsible for their deaths. "I'm glad he's been given this position. It's so hard for him to find work and it can't be good for him to sit at home all day feeling sorry for himself."

"Yeah," Tonks agreed. Lupin fascinated her. He was the most well-read person she had ever met, with a desire to learn that bordered on fanatical. With an insight that beguiled her age, she thought it was because he'd had to fight so hard for the right to get an education in the first place. Even though they couldn't be friends during class, she still looked forward to seeing him at school.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

"Dora, I knew you were intelligent, but I didn't realise just _how_ intelligent. Your mum must love sticking it to her sisters – well, sister," Lupin corrected. He would never stop referring to Andromeda's two sisters in the plural, even though with Bellatrix in Azkaban, Narcissa was really the only one who counted. Narcissa had a boy about Harry Potter's age, and Lupin idly wondered how intelligent the boy was; it would certainly be a blow to the Black pride if Andromeda's half-blood daughter born to a muggle-born wizard turned up to be more intelligent and talented than Narcissa's precious full-blood boy. But that wasn't something he would discover until at least next year.

Tonks smiled, pleased at the compliment. Close by, Charlie Weasley looked flabbergasted. "Dora?" he asked. "Since when do you get to call her Dora?"

"Since I've known her since she was born," Lupin said. "You probably don't remember but this was when Sirius was still in people's good books – well, as much as a Gryffindor-placed Black can be – and he and your mum were really close, so by extension, James, Peter and I saw a lot of Andy and Tonks."

Charlie grinned. "OK, now you're making stuff up. No-one calls her Andy." He should know, he and Tonks had been friends since first year and Andromeda gave a patented Black Death Glare to anyone who called her anything but Mrs. Tonks or, if you were fortunate enough to be on a degree of familiarity with her, Andromeda.

Lupin shrugged. "It was just Sirius's name for her. I've never presumed to be an equal of hers, but we go back far enough that Sirius's kid-cousin relationship with her somewhat extended to us, too." He shared a conspiring look with Tonks. He was a werewolf and a half-blood and as friendly a relationship as he had with Andromeda Tonks, he wouldn't dream to presume that he was the equal of a full-human and a Black. The way Tonks smiled at him made him think that she didn't give a shit what he was or wasn't, she liked his company and that was all that counted.

"You are, like, totally the coolest DADA teacher we've ever had," Tonks enthused later that week. He had a two-bedroom, kitchen and bathroom set of rooms near the DADA classrooms, the front room of which he used for an office where his students had been trickling into over the week. Tonks was right; he was proving to be a very popular DADA teacher. Of course, it helped that she was the only one who knew about his werewolf status. He knew his students – and more importantly, their parents – wouldn't think so highly of him if they knew what he became once a month.

He sipped on his Wolfsbane potion. It was revolting, but if he didn't take it, he became a fully-fledged werewolf on the full moon rather than a harmless wolf. And to be fair, whatever Snape's issue's were with him – and Lupin couldn't work out what his issues were because Lupin had taken the DADA position he wanted so badly, or because of a schoolboy grudge – he made one of the best potions around. "You know young Charlie Weasley has a crush on you," he mused.

"He does not!"

"I've seen the way he looks at you. He definitely does. I'm only curious about how long for."

"But Charlie – Charlie's my best mate," Tonks said.

"Friendships are often the best foundations for relationships," he said. "He's a terrific guy – a hell of an improvement on Richard Malfoy," he said dryly. He had, fortunately, only had to share a year with Lucius Malfoy when he had been a student at Hogwarts – he had been a first-year when Lucius was seventh – and that had been a year too much for Lupin's liking... and it appeared his nephew was going to be the same.

"I know. Charlie's a total sweetie. But I don't feel about him that way. Honestly, I'm not that fussed on boys. Charlie's not like that, but so many of them – most of them, actually – only want me because I can be any fantasy."

"Beats _nobody_ wanting you because of your lycanthropy," Lupin countered. "Sorry, I didn't mean to sound bitter, especially around a student."

"No biggie," she said breezily. She kind of liked that he felt he could still say something like that, even without meaning to. "I'll catch you around, OK?" she asked. He nodded, and she departed.

_Such a great kid_, he thought. She could be a handful – Professor Sprout said she had a singular inability to behave, despite being a brilliant student who would otherwise have been a shoo-in for Prefect and then Head Girl – but it was little more than the compulsive mischievous streak James and Sirius had possessed. You could tell that beneath the adolescent enjoyment for breaking the rules, there was a girl with a good heart who made a good friend and would make a good wife and mother one day.

He was surprised at how sharp his feeling of loss was that _he_ would never have a wife and mother of his children, let alone one like Tonks. He had long ago resigned himself to the fact that it would never happen for him. Not only was it highly unlikely that any decent woman would be interested in being with him, but he felt it would be irresponsible to take on a commitment like that. He couldn't take from a woman, even one who might even love him, the chance to live without people looking down on her the way they looked down on him.

He had long since resigned himself to being alone, but sometimes it really got to him, and for some reason, thinking about what Tonks had to offer as a wife and mother had hit a nerve when it came to his own situation.

* * *

"Dora! I'm surprised to see you here. Isn't there a Quidditch match on? It's all anyone can talk about."

Tonks made a face. "I know – it _is_ all anyone can talk about... and Hufflepuff aren't even one of the freaking teams." It was a Slytherin-Gryffindor match, which always generated a lot of interest. "I don't play Quidditch, too clumsy. What about you? I thought James Potter loved Quidditch."

"He did. I even went to all the Gryffindor matches to support him because he was my best friend. But I don't get the appeal of the game. I don't get the appeal of flying around in a circle trying to catch a bit of flying gold and belting the crap out of the other team. It doesn't actually _achieve_ anything but get people injured."

Tonks laughed at that. "That totally sounds like you," she said. "I tend to agree... but maybe that's because I was always too clumsy to play."

"I've seen you fly. You're not bad."

She shrugged. "Oh, I can fly well enough, though I prefer Floo and Appirating. But I can't fly like Charlie. He's amazing. He has this inhuman instinct when it comes to balancing, stopping and turning. He can do stuff on his Cleensweep that Malfoy can't do on his precious Nimbus 2000."

Lupin laughed at that. Richard Malfoy had boasted long and loud enough about the brand-new model of broomsticks that had just come out – expensive as hell and at least for a year while they were a novelty, reserved only for the richest magical families – but for all that, he wasn't a particularly good flier. Or all that intelligent, either; he tended to rely on his arrogance and reputation to get what he wanted, which didn't go down well either in Lupin's class or any of the girls in the houses _other_ than Slytherin.

In short, Richard Malfoy was a bullying git with limited talented and even more limited popularity outside of his own house.

"If you promise not to tell Sprout – or Dumbledore, or anyone else, for that matter – d'you want a butterbeer? I had a hankering for something a little stronger than tea myself and I hate to drink alone." Butterbeer wasn't particularly strong, and it was freely available to students at one of the pubs on Hogsmead weekends but as a Professor, he wasn't supposed to give it to students. But it wasn't like he was trying to get her drunk and anyway, she was of age, and the faculty tended to turn a blind eye to a lot of the stuff students who were of-age did that were technically not allowed.

Tonks smiled. "Sounds good," she said. Another thing she didn't particularly like about Quidditch was how _obsessed_ her classmates were with it. She had never been one to indulge in obsessive fangirl behaviour. She would much rather share a few butterbeers with Lupin than be out on the pitch screaming over a silly game.

He retrieved two butterbeers from his fridge, and she commented that the contents consisted of alcohol, chocolate and raw meat. "I can't for the life of me explain to the house elves how raw I like my meet, so I find it's easier just to make an appearance at mealtimes and cook my own food here. And I've always had a sweet tooth. Loved third year when we could go to Hogsmead and hit Honeydukes. Second-hand books and robes I could live with, but chocolate was probably my biggest expense." He smiled indulgently and for a moment, he looked like a third-year student who would go without a lot of things if it meant keeping him in chocolate.

They found each other to be highly enjoyable company and before either of them knew it, there was a knock on the door. "Tonks?" came Charlie's voice.

"In here," she called back. Charlie opened the door. A small frown flashed across his face when he saw the girl he was deeply infatuated with sitting straddled on the chair facing backwards, half a dozen empty butterbeer bottles on the table. He'd tried letting her know that he was keen on her, but she seemed oblivious to both his and every other male's interest – except maybe Professor Lupin's. Not that Lupin's interest in her was romantic or sexual, of course, but she seemed far keener to hang out with Lupin than she did him.

"Sorry, my bad, I shouldn't have let her drink that much," Lupin said guiltily when he saw Charlie's brief but very apparent frown – further proving that he had feelings for Tonks. He must be disappointed that she had blown off his game to hang out with a Professor. "How'd the game go?"

"We won," Charlie said. "Four-thirty to three-fifty."

"Good," Lupin said. "I'm not a big fan of the game but you can never stop a Gryffindor boy being a Gryffindor boy. Dora says you're a phenomenal flier."

He liked the casual way he called her 'Dora' even less than he liked the fact she'd missed his game to hang out drinking with a Professor. "I suppose," he mumbled. "Tonks, Sprout won't be impressed if she finds out you've been drinking with a Professor."

"I'll take the blame," Lupin said immediately, and both of them knew they wouldn't put him in that position if they could avoid it. In just a few weeks, he had proven to be the most popular, most competent DADA Professor in anyone's memory, and neither of them wanted him to get into trouble.

"I actually came to see if she wants to come to our celebration party," Charlie said. It was common for all three Houses to unite in their celebration parties when one of them beat Slytherin. "Sprout won't know the difference if she was drinking here or drinking there."

"I'll pretend I didn't hear that if you pretend you didn't see this," Lupin said dryly. He remembered from his own days how freely the butterbeer – and, when someone was particularly ingenious, which James and Sirius inevitably were, the firewhisky – flowed after they had won a match, and how no-one cared how old a student was. But it was a tradition as old as Hogwarts, or at least Quidditch, itself and he figured it wasn't his place to say anything against their hijinks. Idly, he wondered if they had ever really pulled the wool over McGonagall's eyes or she had just turned a blind eye to something that had been tradition in her own time.

He watched Tonks go. It was clear from the way Charlie put his hand on the small of her back – ostensibly to steady her, but anyone who knew how he felt about her could see otherwise – that he had strong feelings for her, and that he was disappointed – maybe even pissed off – that she had blown off seeing his game, and seeing him win, to hang out with him. He wondered how long Charlie had had feelings for her; hopefully not long, since it would take an idiot to not realise that Tonks wasn't particularly interested in dating and Charlie wasn't a stupid boy – but then, it could be longer, because Charlie seemed to have quite strong feelings for her. Lupin's Legilimencyskills were limited to picking up vague emotions off people and projecting he thoughts onto an individual if he thought them hard enough, and he was picking up some strong feelings from Charlie.

Maybe it was the butterbeer, maybe it was the way he liked pricking at egos, but he felt the urge to flash Tonks a message. _He's still totally got the hots for you_.

Tonks giggled and, distracted at the random amusement that was Lupin's message – she had known he had a passing ability at Legilimency, but had never personally witnessed it – stumbled slightly. "Something funny?" Charlie asked.

"Um... no," she said quickly. Charlie would be humiliated if he knew that Lupin knew he had feelings for her... which she still hoped that he didn't. Charlie was a great guy and all, sweet and a good friend to her, but she didn't feel _that way_ about him.

* * *

"_Now_ can I call you Remus?" Tonks asked, smiling.

"_Now_ you can call me Remus," he said, walking through the spacious Tonks house, decorated with every inch with Christmas decorations. "Your dad certainly likes to go crazy," he mused.

Tonks laughed. "And none of them move," she said, gesturing to the tinsel and ornaments that were indeed, completely stationary. "He's so proud of his roots. I think it's because he got so much crap for marrying a Black that he refused to apologize for it or act like being a muggle-born made him less than any other wizard."

"He's a very nice man. I can see where you get it from."

Tonks laughed, and Lupin was struck by how different her laugh was when she was with him... more sincere. He was beginning to realise how much or her persona around other males was a practiced aloofness, a means of telling boys – and men – that she wasn't interested. He was flattered that she felt she could be herself around him, but also felt a little sorry for her that she felt he was one of the few men she _could_ be herself around. It had to be lonely, in its own way.

Dinner was excellent. Like any good Black woman, Andromeda had been taught to cook spectacularly – food that was delicious and had a lot of flair. Of course, she didn't so much 'cook' as wave her wand around – "But I did it without the help of a house-elf, which is more than can be said of either of my sisters... well, of Cissy," she corrected. "I doubt Bellatrix is doing any cooking where she is."

Lupin laughed at that. "I'm curious, though – how come you call Bellatrix Bellatrix but Narcissa Cissy?"

"Because Ted said it was a very appropriate name for her," Andromeda said. "The least talented and the most cowardly of the three of us, she and Lucius are cut from the same mould, really. It makes me almost respect Bellatrix. At least she stands by what she believes in... even if it _is_ an evil monster who wants to destroy anyone who's not a pure-blood. And follows the party line," she added. "The Weasley's aren't exactly regulars at Malfoy Manor, except when Arthur's leading the charge to confiscate something."

"Charlie's a good kid," Lupin noted.

"They all are," Ted said. "I like Molly. I wouldn't know that they're both as pure-blood as they come." Andromeda swatted him playfully, but the reality was, the majority of purebloods thought they were better than halfbloods and muggle-borns. "Aren't you a pureblood, Remus? I mean – well, as far as it goes. Dromeda keeps trying to explain it to me, but my head starts to go foggy after a few words."

"You need four grandparents and no more than one great-grandparent to be considered a pureblood," Lupin explained. "My grandfather was muggle-born so possibly my children would have been purebloods – all this being hypothetical, of course," he said dryly.

"_Can_ you have children?" Ted asked. "I don't mean to pry so if I've stepped over the line –"

"It's fine. As far as anyone knows, I _can't_ actually get a woman – a human woman, I mean – pregnant with my werewolf side. It's more that I don't exactly have a huge group of women rushing to go out with me." There was an awkward silence at that. "It's fine, really. It's been over twenty years. You can get used to almost anything in that time. I've seen people adjust harder and longer to peace."

"That's true," Andromeda said, relieved to have another subject. "It was so gradual and we lived with it for so long that _not_ living with it was scary in itself."

Lupin grinned good-naturedly. "And here I was thinking that Dora got her wisdom from her father."

After dessert, Tonks took him into the garden. "It's dad's handiwork mostly, but mum cleans it up. I think she _likes_ knowing she has a garden to rival her sister's that she did without a house-elf."

"I hadn't _seen_ a house-elf until I came to Hogwarts," Lupin said cheerfully. "I don't think my life has been worse off for it – especially in the bigger picture."

She leaned into him. It was a cold night, even for December, and his body temperature ran higher than that of a full-human. She told herself it was only because of that. "The thing is we could afford a manor and a house-elf if we wanted. Mum's dad's will was such that it couldn't get broken after her so-called betrayal, and a third passed down to her. Hell, since Bellatrix is likely to die childless in Azkaban, it's likely she'll actually end up with half. We're not quite as wealthy as the Malfoys because Lucius brought his own money to the marriage, but we're up there. Mum just doesn't like living that kind of life. She thinks there's no point and it breeds entitlement."

"I'd tend to agree with her," Lupin said sagely. "Look at the Weasley's. They've got less than me after it gets divided between nine people but they're the most honest, hardworking people I know – and they always seem to be having a lot of fun."

"You've met them?"

"A few times, Molly was one of the first people to contact me. She really is such a kind-hearted soul. To tell the truth, I loved being there, but I felt awful. I can't just tell all and sundry about me, but when she's banging on about what a good teacher I am and how all my students love me and I feel like a fraud."

"You're not a fraud, Remus, but you're right, you can't just go around telling all and sundry. I'm sure it wouldn't bother you, but she's something of a gossip. In fact, I think it was her who got this thing about me and Charlie started."

"What thing?"

"Oh, everyone thinks we've been together for ages. Like, since first year. I think Molly saw how good friends we are and thought she'd will it and told enough people that a rumour started that's never gone away."

"He hasn't exactly helped matters with the way he feels about you."

"I think you're reading too much into things, Remus. If he has feelings for me, why hasn't he said anything?"

"Probably because you put on that disinterested act all the time," Lupin suggested.

Tonks shrugged. "It's not an act, I'm really _not_ interested. And I'm not going to say anything and risk embarrassing us both until he does. Besides, I don't think about him that way. He's really nice and all, but –"

"You ever thought about kissing him?" Lupin asked, surprised that he'd asked such a person question, let alone to a student. He'd said it was OK to call him Remus since it was the Christmas holidays and he'd been invited to dinner as a guest, not a Professor, but still... And he was surprised by how he felt when he asked it. He couldn't be jealous – he told himself it was because he had known her for so long that he considered her to be a kind of quasi-niece.

"No," Tonks said, making a face. Then, "I don't like kissing."

"How can you not like kissing? I mean, I get that you might not like the _person_ you're kissing, but – oh, I see," he said. Whoever she'd kissed, she hadn't liked them or the experience much. He wondered who it had been; it sounded like there had been more than one boy. Not that it was any of his business. "Kissing's fun," he said casually. "You just need to find someone you're attracted to... and who likes you for yourself."

"_That_ sounded very jaded," Tonks said. "Which did you fail on?"

"Neither, exactly. I had a few girls interested in me in school – enough that I got to kiss them. And I liked it – I really liked it. When it's with someone you like and are attracted to – but that's neither here nor there. The problem is that I have scars over most of my body and they're pretty difficult to explain – apart from the obvious. In the end I figured if they were turned off by the scars, then they'd be turned off by the cause."

"I'm so sorry."

"It's OK. In retrospect, I realised that it was better for them to be turned off early in the relationship than when it got serious."

They sat down on an ornate stone bench. "It's not fair that you should be lonely like this."

"It's OK, Dora. I appreciate that you care but it's OK. If there was ever a werewolf who wasn't going to feel the pinch of solitude, it's someone as bookish as me. Hell, sometimes James and Sirius drove me bonkers with how much interaction they needed. I'd want to whack them with whatever book they were distracting me from."

"But you must want adult company sometimes," she said. "I mean, on a personal level, not just the other teachers at Hogwarts." Besides, all the other teachers at Hogwarts were older than him, most by a fair bit; his only equal in age was Severus Snape, who had taken an instant dislike to him – or, rather, picked up an old schoolboy grudge.

"Sometimes," he agreed. "But it's like I told you dad, you get used to a lot in twenty years."

He had his hands folded in his lap, and even in the quarter-moonlight, she could see the scars on the back of them. She couldn't believe she hadn't seen them before. "Can I –?" she asked tentatively, reaching for his hand, a series of scars criss-crossed them. "How did this happen?" she asked, although she had a vague idea.

"Wolfsbane's only a fairly recent invention – the last ten years. Before that, I had to be isolated. Not having any humans to bite and scratch, I bit and scratched myself. Werewolf scars are cursed, they can't be healed or disguised. I'm grateful that I never scratched my face. People tend not to look at my hands too much but they do look at my face. I like to think there was some human part in me that knew how people would react to me if my scars were so obvious."

"I think they're beautiful," she said suddenly. Needless to say, he looked surprised at that. "It was in your nature to hurt humans. I know that sounds bad but you couldn't help it – my aunt took a great deal of pleasure out of hurting people, and she should have been able to help it. You couldn't. You kept yourself isolated instead so you could only hurt yourself. I think that shows courage and compassion." Impulsively, she brought his hands to her mouth and kissed his scars.

He jerked his hands away, the intimate affection hitting him like a massive jolt of electricity. "Please don't."

Her eyes went wide to see Lupin, who had always been so laid-back around her, jerk back suddenly from her touch as if burned. "Have I done something wrong?"

"No."

"Did I say something I shouldn't have? I can really put my foot in it sometimes. I get into so much trouble over it."

"Dora, you haven't done anything wrong, I promise."

"Then why did you pull away from me like I'd mortally insulted you?"

He flushed, embarrassed – she could see that even by the sliver of moonlight. "It's been a long time since I was with a woman, and you're a very attractive woman – _girl_," he corrected, even though Tonks was overage, so she legally counted as a woman.

She flushed with pleasure at the backhanded compliment. "You think I'm attractive?" she asked. She'd had plenty of males tell her she was beautiful, gorgeous, sexy, far greater compliments than simply 'very attractive' but somehow they didn't mean anything compared to the way Lupin said she was a very attractive woman.

"That's not the point, Dora. I don't want you touching me."

He said this with such force – and a strong streak of bitterness – in his voice that made her not say anything, only nod in understanding, even though she was longing to ask so many things. Was he attracted to her? Did he think about kissing her? Or was it just that it had been so long since he'd been with a woman and he didn't want to get too close to one of his students?

* * *

Lupin was glad to get home after his rendezvous with Tonks. It had seemed so innocent to take a walk with her, but he'd ended up feeling uncomfortable around her. She was a damn attractive girl, even with that bright pink hair that she loved so much, and it had been so long since he'd been with a woman... and part of him knew that it had very little to do with that.

Nymphadora Tonks was an enchanting young woman that if things had been different – if he hadn't been too old, too poor, and too dangerous – he could see himself being with. He wished she hadn't kissed his hands. If it had just been a hug, he could have dealt with that. But the kiss – it had made him think about taking her in his arms and kissing her, feeling the taste of her mouth, the feel of her tongue, her arms around his neck, her hands in his hair...

_Stop it!_ He ordered himself. He had to go back to Hogwarts after Christmas, he certainly couldn't be thinking about kissing a student while he was trying to teach. And even if he _wasn't_ her Professor – which, in all fairness, would be true enough in less than six months – he was still a werewolf who had, at least in the eyes of society, had no right to look twice at a human, let alone a Black.

He long ago resigned himself to being alone. It was better not to hope for anything more that, perhaps, professional respect and the admiration of his students. And it was certainly best not to engage in little fantasies that involved a student whose bloodline was way superior to his, even if he hadn't been cursed.

* * *

Tonks lay wide-awake in bed that night, unable to sleep. Was Lupin attracted to her? Was _she_ attracted to _him_? She – she thought so. She had known him most of her life, but since he had started teaching at Hogwarts, she had started seeing him in a different light. She had never realised just how intelligent he was, for one. And then there was the way he would let her hang out with him in his office, even letting her drink – rather unprofessional, but loads of fun.

She'd certainly not had fun like that with any other boy – maybe it was because Lupin was a _man_. And she'd never felt respected the way Lupin made her feel respected.

And she'd never wanted anyone to kiss her like she'd wanted him to kiss her.

Tossing restlessly in bed, she fell asleep thinking about her Professor and the fact she felt something for him that she didn't feel for anyone else – certainly not any other of her Professors.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

"Dora? Merlin's beard, what's wrong? Here," Lupin said, placing his hand tentatively on the small of her back and steering her into his office. She had run into him, visibly distressed and not seeing him until she had literally run straight into him. He'd wrapped his arms around her to steady her. She was shaking and crying; clearly, something had rattled her deeply; Tonks wasn't the type to get rattled easily.

He led her into his office and eased her down onto the couch. "You want to talk about it?" he asked. She shook her head vehemently through her tears. "Are you sure? It usually helps. It certainly can't hurt. Hey, this can even be one of those times when I'm your friend and not you're Professor."

She sniffled. "It was Richard Malfoy. He's been hassling me to go out with him for ages – well, not exactly go out with him, if you know what I mean," she said bitterly. Lupin nodded knowingly. Richard Malfoy, like just about every Malfoy that had come before him, would dream of publicly dating a half-blood; what he no doubt wanted from Tonks was a little action in a deserted corridor... or maybe the Room of Requirement. Lupin had no doubt that it had been used plenty of times as a romantic getaway for some of the older students. "I'm pretty good at discouraging him but he gets more and more persistent. And today – just then –" she started crying again, and Lupin rubbed small circles across her back gently in silent support. "He kissed me and I wanted him to stop but he's so much stronger than me –" At this, she broke into choking sobs that wracked her body.

He stopped rubbing her back and tentatively put his arm around her. She didn't push him away. "It's OK," he said soothingly. "At least that's all he did." Malfoy's uncle – Tonks's uncle, too, come to think of it, though by marriage, not blood – was renowned for his opinions that muggles, muggle-born wizards and half-bloods were useful in their place – doing menial jobs and providing entertainment and enjoyment for purebloods, enjoyment... of a sexual nature. He wanted to growl but was scared of frightening Tonks even more than she was already.

She sniffled. "How do you know?"

He chuckled softly. "I don't think you want to know."

She looked at him, and there was a hint of a spark of curiosity in her eyes, which Lupin had to be an improvement on the sea of distress she had just been in. "No, tell me," she insisted.

"It's a werewolf thing," he said. "I can – um – tell – Merlin, Dora, don't make me spell this out," he blustered. He could sense her sexual purity, her virginity. It meant that at least Richard Malfoy had done nothing more that paw her. He wrapped his arm around her tighter. "You need to talk to Dumbledore," he said.

She shook her head. "No. I can't. I just want to forget about it."

He could sort of understand where she was coming from. She wanted to forget that it had ever happened. Which it wouldn't, if Richard Malfoy was the type to force his attentions onto someone who had made it clear that she didn't want them, he was hardly the type to stop there; Lupin made a mental note to have a private word to Snape. The two Professors didn't get along, but Snape was smart enough to know how badly Richard could reflect on the Slytherin name if behaviour like that was left unchecked. And he figured if he didn't mention it to Tonks, then she couldn't tell him no, so he wouldn't be defying her wishes. "OK," he agreed. "Can I at least say something to Charlie?"

"Charlie Weasley?" she asked dully, and it occurred to him that she hadn't given him much thought. "Why?"

"He'll look after you," he said. "He cares about you a great deal and no-one's going to harass someone under his protection," Lupin said. Not even Richard Malfoy was that full of himself – or that stupid, whichever the bigger problem was.

"I'm not going out with him just so I can have his protection," Tonks said indignantly.

"I'm not suggesting that. He'll do it just as a friend, I'm sure. I don't understand why you're so disinterested in him, to be honest," he said. "He's crazy about you."

"He's my mate. I'm not interested in him like that. I'm not interested in anyone like that." And remembering what Richard had done to her – not that it was easy to forget – and started crying again.

"Here," he said, conjuring up what was effectively a very powerful mouthwash. He used it after a full moon when the taste of wolf clung to his mouth, and figured it would help Tonks now.

She gulped it down, and he silently passed her a cup to spit it back into. "I can't still taste him," she admitted. "I can still feel his hands on me..."

"Yuk," he said. She was crying now, and looked so pitiful and vulnerable and sweet at the same time that he didn't know what possessed him, he pressed his lips against hers. She immediately started crying and wrapped her arms around his neck as though nothing had happened and he knew instantly that she had returned the attraction he'd been starting to feel for her. God – everything about this was so wrong – and yet – and yet – he flicked his tongue into her mouth and searched out for hers as gently as he could manage. She returned the favour eagerly, if a little clumsily, and pressed her body against his. Her very clumsiness was enchanting. It had been a while since he had been with anyone who wasn't a seasoned prostitute.

God, what would she think of him to know that was mostly how he got his rocks off? Not that he could help it exactly. It was usually easier to reduce it to a financial transaction, services for money, then try and get someone to fall in love with him despite his lycanthropy. And yet here with Tonks, with her arms wrapped around him, kissing him eagerly, if awkwardly, making him feel that maybe she was attracted to him for herself and might even be capable of falling in love with him...

He pushed her down onto her back so he was on top of her. She tangled her legs up in his; she had a fair bit of strength in them. "Dora," he whispered huskily, feeling a desire that he hadn't felt in a long time – couldn't remember ever feeling, come to think of it. There was something very clinical about using a prostitute, a lack of genuine attraction and affection – both thinks that he felt for Tonks. Grinding his body against hers, it didn't take him long to get hard.

"Remus, wait," she cried breathlessly, the thrill of his kisses and his body against hers at odds with her apprehensions about having sex with him. "I'm a virgin."

Her words were as effective as if a bucket of cold water had been thrown on him. He stopped immediately and scrambled into a sitting position. "_Shit_," he said, her words bringing him back to reality immediately. She was a _student_ – _his_ student.

"I didn't mean to do anything wrong," she said in a small voice.

"You haven't, Dora – Miss Tonks," he said, scrambling for a means to retrieve some of the dignity he had just forfeited by kissing a freaking student. And the worse thing was, he still wanted to kiss her. "I shouldn't have kissed you."

"I wanted you to. I want you to kiss me again."

"Oh, Jesus, don't tell me that," he groaned. He turned his face from her so he wouldn't have to look at that delectable mouth. "You need to leave before I do something that can get me fired," he said.

"Remus –" she reached out to touch him.

He pulled his arm away. "_Please_, Dora," he begged her. "You don't want me to be fired, do you?"

"Of course not."

"Then please leave. I'll sort this thing with Malfoy out for you – _without_ saying anything to Dumbledore or Sprout," he added, hoping she didn't realise that he had omitted Snape and Charlie from that list of people he wouldn't tell.

Thankful, Tonks left after he had pleaded with her to go. He collapsed into the couch then, distracted by the smell of her, got up and padded into his bedroom. God, he couldn't believe how close he had come to seducing a student – or did just kissing her constitute as seduction? _You made out with her, Remus_, he reminded himself. Rubbing up against her to get hard hardly counted as 'just kissing'. And if she hadn't cried out that she was still a virgin – he wasn't sure he would have thought of that himself. He shuddered with disgust at how badly he had behaved.

At least it had just ended with a kiss, or a – very – brief make out session. And he wouldn't allow himself to be alone with her from now on. Actually, not being alone with _any_ student was probably a good idea, except maybe Malfoy. It would feel good to smack him around a little, give him a taste of his own medicine when it came to assaulting someone smaller than him. Actually on second thought, being alone with Malfoy probably wasn't a good idea. Not much would be achieved in pissing off such a powerful family.

But he _would_ speak to Snape.

He located the Potions Master in his office the next day, momentarily wondering how his and Snape's classrooms were both in the lower floors of the castle but the Potions rooms were so much drearier than his DADA rooms. Snape looked up at him, a scowl on his face. The man had never forgiven him for being part of the group that had tormented him when they had been students, even though it had really only been James and Sirius behind it, and in all fairness, Snape had given as well as he got. And then there was the fact that he had taken the position Snape wanted so badly – Dumbledore didn't trust him as DADA Professor. Even though it was Snape's own fault that, as one of the most notable Death Eaters, Dumbledore didn't trust him to teach the class.

"Remus," Snape said with barely civil professionalism.

"Severus," Lupin replied with just as civil professionalism, refraining from using the 'Snivellus' nickname that James had given him. "Tell Malfoy to keep his grubby hands off students who aren't interested in his attention," he snapped.

"I've no idea what you're talking about."

_You wouldn't_, Lupin thought contemptuously. Snape owed a lot of his success to the Malfoys – specifically, Richard's uncle Lucius – and had likely been overlooking any of Richard's misbehaviour. He wondered what would happen when Lucius's son started next year. "Richard Malfoy. He assaulted Nymphadora Tonks yesterday. He's been coming onto her for ages and won't take no for an answer. I thought you might like to know before he did something that _really_ makes your House look bad." He said that with heavy irony, because almost every Death Eater had come out of Slytherin, including Snape, and the House already had a bad name as far as everyone who wasn't super-gung-ho about blood purity.

Snape frowned. He was aware that Malfoy wasn't one to take _no _for an answer, but he hadn't known the boy was taking it that far. "That girl has half the male students panting after her," he said, as if it was all Tonks's fault, much easier to blame it on Sprout's supervisory methods than his own.

"_That girl_ is not to blame for being what she is," Lupin said shortly.

Snape's black eyes glinted maliciously. "You seem to have an awfully special interest in her," he said.

"I've known her most of my life, get your mind out of the gutter," Lupin snapped. _Rich coming from someone who followed Lily Evans around like an infatuated puppy dog_, he thought. "He's _your_ student, do something about him before he does something that really traumatises her and you look like an idiot who can't control his students," Lupin said, turning on his heel and stalking out of the room. He had no doubt Snape would do as he had instructed; he had too much to lose if one of the students in his House did anything more than force his kisses on another student. _As if that's not bad enough_, Lupin thought.

Next he went to speak to Charlie. Typically, the young man was on the Quidditch pitch, practicing his flying – not that he needed it. Lupin started to feel dizzy just watching him. He was at least as good as James was.

Charlie did another few laps of the pitch before coming down in a swift descent and abrupt stop. "You're good," he said approvingly.

"You ever play?"

"Hardly, the only interest I ever had in Quidditch was the fact it would clear out the common room so I could study," Lupin said with a smile. "I can fly OK but I'm not as good as that."

"You sound like Tonks. I'm actually floored how graceful she is on a broomstick, given how clumsy she is on her feet."

"She was more graceful as a toddler than she is as an adult," Lupin admitted. "Sometimes I think it's an affectation she's taken on to try and discourage interest in her. That's actually why I came to see you." He explained briefly about Malfoy's assault on her – omitting, of course, the fact that it had resulted in they're own make out session. "Charlie _do not_ go and do anything to Malfoy. I've spoken to Snape, he'll keep the boy in line. All you'll do is get yourself into trouble."

"Then what do you want me to do?"

"Keep an eye out on her. Malfoy's not the only one who's been paying her unwanted attention – surely you know that." Charlie nodded. Sometimes he thought he was the only one who liked Tonks for her intelligent, clumsy self and not the fact she could be any man's fantasy. "No-one's going to try anything if they know you're keeping an eye on her."

"You mean if she's my girlfriend?" Charlie asked. "I've already tried that."

"Try harder. You're good friends already, and that makes for the best of foundations for a relationship."

Charlie eyed him suspiciously. "How well do you know her?" he asked.

"Well enough that Andy will hold me personally responsible if something happens to her while she's at Hogwarts," Lupin said. "Well enough that I will _feel_ personally responsible if something happens to her while she's a Hogwarts. I've known her all her life. I actually knew Andy and Ted when they were students here. I can't keep an eye on her myself without getting her into a world of grief for showing favourites – but no-one's going to bat an eyelid if you were to, say, choose to be her protector."

Charlie nodded. "Sorry," he said. "I didn't realise that's the way you felt about her. I thought – God, I know this sounds really stupid and like I'm behaving like a jealous boyfriend when I'm not even a boyfriend, but, well, the amount of time she was spending with you, I thought, well, I thought you were behaving... _inappropriately_ towards her."

Lupin was glad he didn't blush easily or his emotions would have given him away. He had _definitely_ behaved inappropriately towards her. "I told her I couldn't be her friend at school, but it doesn't seem to have worked well," he said. "But I _can't_ be that kind of friend to her. So I'd appreciate it if you could keep an eye out on her. So would Andy and Ted," he added, giving Charlie an incentive to make an effort with Tonks. "Oh, and for the love of God, _don't_ tell anyone I told you this – especially not her. I promised her I wouldn't tell anyone. Actually, I promised her I wouldn't tell Dumbledore or Sprout and conveniently left out you and Snape."

He left Charlie feeling that he had sorted it as much as he could. He really couldn't afford to show Tonks any favouritism, and it was _definitely_ in both their best interests for him to stay clear of her.

* * *

"Did Remus say anything to you?" Tonks asked suspiciously when Charlie followed her to the Hufflepuff portrait for the third night in a row. "That _shit_! He said he wouldn't say anything."

"He's worried about you, Tonks, and I don't blame you. He's kind of like an uncle to you, isn't he? Wasn't he part of the little gang of your mum's cousin?"

_Is that what he told him_? Tonks wondered. She supposed she should be grateful that Lupin had thought of something to explain the extraordinary amount of time they had been spending together. "I have an uncle," she said shortly. "In fact I have a mutual uncle with Richard Malfoy."

Charlie made a face. "Isn't that kind of incestuous?" he asked.

She snorted derisively. "This coming from a pureblood?" she asked. Given that breeding with a muggle-born ruined pure-blood for three generations – and that was only by the textbook definition, plenty of people, like her aunts and uncles on her mother's side thought it should go back much further than that – to maintain pureblood most pureblood families had been intermarrying for generations. Charlie's own parents were distant cousins, and the fact his father was a Black meant that _she_ and Charlie were distantly related, too. "Richard and I aren't biologically related – least no more than you and I are," she added.

Charlie never knew what to make of comments like that. Was she making a point about considering him more like a cousin because they were distantly related, or was it just one of those snappy comments she had in her arsenal because she was used to being on the defensive about her half-blood status? "So you consider me and Richard to be equal dating status, then?" he asked jokingly. She shot him a disgusted look. "Sorry, that was in really bad taste," he apologised.

"Damn straight it was."

"Hey, c'mon, Tonks," he said, grabbing her hand. "I'm really trying here."

She closed her eyes. It was actually easier to deal with Charlie when he wasn't looking at her with those puppy-dog eyes. Maybe she _should_ give him a chance. It wasn't like she had a lot of offers from boys who _weren't_ only interested in her for her shapeshifting abilities. And she and Charlie had a good camaraderie, and that was always a good foundation for a relationship, wasn't it? "I know you are," she said.

"So – can I kiss you?" he asked.

"If you want to."

"You don't sound very eager."

Of course, Charlie would have had girls throwing at him since their hormones had kicked it – big Quidditch star and all. Actually, _none_ of the Weasleys seemed to have trouble attracting attentions, except maybe the twins, who seemed more wrapped up in each other and their penchant for mischief than girls, who were only eleven anyway. "Sorry," she said. "I just didn't like my other experiences much." It was a handy enough excuse because it was close enough to the truth – although she had liked her second experience well enough.

"Of course," he said understandingly. "Here." He took her hands in his and placed them against his chest. "Push me away if you don't like it. Smack me if you like. It can't possible hurt worse than having a bludger hit you."

This of course only made Tonks feel worse for her disinterest in him, because he was such a nice guy. She nodded, and he leaned in to kiss her.

It wasn't as bad as she had thought it would be, more uninteresting than anything. Not the rough, forceful pawing that Malfoy had done, but not the intense, passionate kissing that she'd shared with Lupin either. She remembered feeling his erection against her thigh and how she'd been excited but apprehensive at the same time. Was that normal? She wasn't sure – but she knew she didn't feel excited by Charlie.

She seemed to be doing it OK, because Charlie wasn't complaining. "Can we go somewhere more private?" he asked.

"Um..." She wondered how many girls Charlie had taken 'somewhere more private'.

"It's OK if you don't want to," he said. "I just don't usually like girls as much as you."

"But – half the girls at school have massive crushes on you... including the first-years!"

"That doesn't mean I return the interest," he said. "I've liked you for ages." He resisted the urge to add that he hadn't been going out with anyone who would have him while waiting for her to return his interest, either, unlike a certain Slytherin.

She looked at him boggle-eyed, understanding what he meant even if he didn't say it. "You're a virgin?" she asked.

"Would it make you feel better if I said yes?"

"Depends if you were telling the truth or not," she found herself, actually bantering with him. She felt less intimidated knowing he was hardly any more experienced than her... although for some reason, she hadn't been intimidated by the fact that Lupin clearly knew what he was doing.

"My reputation as a ladies man is greatly exaggerated," he said. "You want to go for a walk? Percy says the library's always deserted this time of night."

"OK," she agreed shyly. He took her hand and started leading her towards the library, his natural athleticism pulling her behind him. "Charlie, slow down, we're not on the Quidditch pitch," she complained, and Charlie obligingly slowed down. Since the Hufflepuff House was in the basement near the kitchen and the library was on the fourth floor, it meant a lot of walking, holding hands, and Tonks had to wonder if he had chosen the library so it meant leading her through so much of the castle.

But it turned out he was right about the library being nearly deserted at that time of night, apart from bookworms like Percy Weasley. She wondered how much time Lupin had spent here as a student – she was sure that he loved the free access he had as a Professor. "What are you thinking about?" he asked, noticed that she seemed a little distracted.

"How come Percy's such a bookworm and none of the rest of you is?" she asked.

"Bill was pretty bad, but not as bad as Percy. I don't need to be a bookworm, I'm Quidditch captain," he said.

She laughed. "So you only need to stand out at one thing?" she asked.

He shrugged. "Sure. And if I were to do super-well in school then I'd only be following in Bill's footsteps. I may as well be known for my own thing."

"Don't you have like ten more after you?" she asked.

"Five. And they can find their own things to do," he said. "Least Ginny's the only girl; it will be easier for her to stand out on that alone. Ron's the one I feel sorry for. He starts next year and I think it will be hard for him to distinguish himself with five older brothers."

"I'm an only child. I've only got one cousin on my mum's side – Narcissa and Lucius's son, Draco. He starts next year, too."

He laughed. "What is with it with the Malfoys? I swear they stagger their births so there's always at least one of them at Hogwarts."

"I wouldn't put it past them. To hear Uncle Lucius bang on there aren't enough of them in the world to balance out people like your family and my dad. It wouldn't surprise me if they did stagger it so there's always at least one of them to exert their influence."

"He never speaks out against your mum?"

Tonks laughed at that. "I think he's scared of her. It's a common misconception that mum's the weak-willed one of the family because she married a muggle-born, like personal taste has anything to do with strength or conviction. It's easily Narcissa – dad says that Cissy's a good name for her 'cos she's the least talented and most cowardly of the three of them. Mum can be just as strong-willed as Bellatrix, she just tends to be fairer and more reasonable in her thinking. But if she found out about Richard she'd be just as vicious as Bellatrix ever was."

"Sweetheart, I never doubted that your mum is a force to be reckoned with."

"What did you just call me?"

"Sweetheart; do you mind?"

"I guess not."

He sat her down in a deserted corner of the library that was actually quite comfortable, a window seat that overlooked the lake. He leaned into her and started to kiss her again. She responded automatically, following his lead. It was easy enough to pick up, and maybe when she got more experience she'd enjoy it more.

When the library closed, he walked her back to her dorm. "Will you come to my game tomorrow?" he asked her. "Please?" She didn't see the point of it – a lot of pointless flying around and exposing yourself to bludgers – but since he was asking so nicely... She nodded obligingly. "Great! I'll see you tomorrow!" he said enthusiastically, kissing her again before making his way to his own dorm.

"What have you been up to?" he friend Amanda asked her when she made her way into her dorm, passing quickly through the common room and the stares that she was greeted with.

"Nothing," she mumbled.

"Really? You were seen going from here to the library and back again holding Charlie Weasley's hand – and that you spent over two hours in there."

"So?"

"So... are you guys like, on together." She shrugged. "Ohmigod, Tonks, he's liked you for _ages_! You know he's waited all this time for you."

"I didn't ask him to!"

"Yeah, I know – but it's still really romantic that he's waited all this time for you," Amanda gushed. "I wish someone would wait for _me_ like that. Especially Charlie Weasley," she added wistfully. "You're _so_ lucky."

And yet somehow, she didn't feel lucky. She liked Charlie but she didn't feel excited by his touch – not the way she had when Lupin had touched her, and that had been _after_ Malfoy had assaulted her. She climbed into bed even though it was still relatively early and turned her back to Amanda. Amanda didn't take any offense to it; she assumed her friend wanted to be alone with her thoughts about her new boyfriend... when actually her friend wanted to be alone with her thoughts about a certain Professor.

* * *

"I hear you've been seeing a lot of a certain someone," Lupin commented casually a few weeks later – although for someone in a new relationship, Tonks didn't seem like someone newly in love.

"It's no biggie," Tonks said. It was the first time she had been alone with him since that day in his rooms – he had caught on her on the way to her House, which was in the same general area of the castle as his DADA classrooms and personal rooms.

"I think he'll be good for you," he said. He knew he should leave it at that, but some perverse demon in him had to push the point. "Do you – do you like being with him?" he asked.

"I – Remus, I – I don't like being with him. I mean, I don't _mind_ being with him, but I'm not hot for him like –"

"Dore, _please_ don't do this," he pleaded.

"I'm not hot for him like I am for you. Remus, you can't deny that you have feelings for me. You got an erection –"

He pushed her against the wall and slammed his hand against her mouth. "Don't you _ever _say that out loud again," he hissed. "Don't you ever even _think_ that." He took his hand off her mouth, aware of how it would look if someone were to come alone right now and see him with his hand over a student's mouth, having backed her into a wall. "The only reason that happened is because I haven't been with a woman in ages. I don't exactly get a lot of offers."

"I don't believe you," she said shakily.

"I don't care if you don't believe me or not. I can't get involved with you, Dora. I could get into a heap of trouble."

"No you can't, I looked it up. So long as you don't sleep with me –"

"Oh, god, you're even more of a privileged idiot than I first took you for," Lupin snapped. "_So long as you don't sleep with me_," he mimicked in a high-pitched voice that sounded nothing like her. "I'm a werewolf, you stupid girl, I was lucky to get this job in the first place. We're _known_ for being predators. How's it going to look if I get involved with a student?"

"Then you shouldn't have kissed me in the first place," she said.

He glared at her. "Don't try blackmailing me," he snapped. "I'll only lose my job and it won't gain you anything. Go back to your boyfriend, _Miss Tonks_, and forget we ever have this conversation," he said, stalking off.

* * *

A few weeks later, after the next Hogsmead weekend, she knocked on his door tentatively. "Remus? I'm really sorry about what happened before. You were right. I know how hard good jobs are for you to come by – I wouldn't want you to lose this one over me. And you're a great teacher, too, the best we've ever had in DADA. I wouldn't want everyone to lose their Professor over me, either."

"I appreciate that you understand that," he said. She was back from a Hogsmead weekend, which meant she was in casual clothes – fitted jeans and a fluffy blue jumper. He liked her better in her uniform; she didn't look so damn cute then.

"I bought you a present to apologise," she said.

"Dora, I don't need anything. I'd rather you just stayed away from me."

He was staring at her, she realised with a thrill – she was glad she'd had the opportunity to see him in casual clothes rather than her school uniform. "Well, I got it for you, anyway. Mum gives me an allowance and I hardly have any opportunity to spend it so I may as well get you something to apologise for how I behaved. I acted like a spoilt brat – a privileged idiot you were right."

Reluctantly, because he knew she wouldn't go until he'd accepted it, he got up and took the present. It was a bottle of firewhisky and two large slabs of Honeydukes chocolate – honeycomb and choc mint. "That's practically all you've got in your fridge, other than your raw meat," she said.

"Thank you," he said, genuinely touched that she should know what his favourite chocolate was – not to mention the fact that she didn't give a crap why he kept raw meat in his fridge, that was, because it was easier for him to keep his own supply then try explaining to the house elves why he liked his meat so raw. Then, even though he knew before he even said it that he would be an idiot to say it, "I wish you weren't a student."

"Me too."

She was breathing heavily now, and he could smell the desire coming off her skin. He put the firewhisky and chocolate down and she read in his eyes what he intended. She ran into his arms and he lifted her up, spinning her around, kissing her frantically. "Dora – Oh, God – this is so wrong," he murmured between kisses. "Wrap your legs around me, love – that's a girl." Oh, God, what was he doing, trying to push her away on the one hand and encouraging her to do what he liked on the other.

He was an idiot with a death wish. Or at least unemployment wish. And yet he couldn't help himself, especially when she wrapped her legs around his waist. He carried her over to his couch, not daring to take her to the bedroom and add a trialable offense to a sackable offense. He slid his hand inside her jumper, under her shirt, feeling her warm bare skin. He kissed her deeply, searching her tongue out with his, running his hands along her bare skin, abandoning her mouth for her jawline, neck, collarbone... Tonks arched her neck and grabbed a fistful of his hair, pressing his head against her neck. He nipped and sucked at her neck and she writhed underneath him.

After a few minutes he knew he had to slow things down before he frightened her with another erection. He eased them down to a stop and curled up on his side next to her. "You can't breathe a word about this to anyone," he said. She nodded. "I'm serious," he said. "I'll be fired if anyone finds out about this. Damnit, I should have sent you away. I should never have let you in the door."

"Are you going to send me away now?"

"I can't keep my hands off you now," he admitted. He was still idly trailing his fingers across her bare skin under her jumper and shirt. "Dora, if you had any kind of smarts you'd forget about this and go back to Charlie. I'm thirty, you're seventeen. And I'm a werewolf. I think I should be more scared of your parents than I am of being fired."

She giggled. "Mum and dad love you, silly. And you can't be fired, I checked."

"As a friend, sure. But as their daughter's boyfriend? Somehow, I doubt it. And what you checked was the fact I can't be _tried_ so long as I don't sleep with you. Dumbledore can fire me for whatever the hell reason he likes, and parents aren't going to want me teaching their kids if they find out I've been secretly involved with one of my students, which is why you can't breathe a word of this to anyone. Not Charlie, not any of your girlfriends. And I want you to break up with Charlie. I don't share well. You haven't seen him this weekend, have you?" he asked. She shook her head. "I thought not, otherwise I'd be able to smell him on you."

"OK," she agreed happily. "I told you I wasn't attracted to him anyway."

He checked his watched. "And you need to go now or Sprout will be wondering where you are."

She snuggled up to him, trying to weaken his resolve. "When will I see you again?" she asked.

"Give me your timetable tomorrow. I'll work something out. Dora, _you need to go_," he repeated.

Reluctantly, she left. He padded to his fridge; the firewhisky was good for something. _Sweet Merlin, what have I done_? He asked himself. He wiped his mouth but he couldn't get the taste of her off him, couldn't get the feel of her off him, couldn't get the image of her in that cute blue jumper out of his head. There was only one thing that he did know: That he would be seeing her again.


	4. Chapter 4

**_Hey guys! Thanks all for reading and reviewing and thanks to my Beta Richard's Confessor._**

**Chapter Four**

"I don't understand. What have I done?"

"Nothing, Charlie, I swear. I just – don't feel that way about you. I tried, I swear."

"You don't like me?"

"It's not that I don't like you – I just don't feel anything when I'm with you. I liked having you as a friend, but –"

"I don't turn you on," he said flatly. "I thought so." He hadn't slept with anyone, but he'd kissed enough girls to know when they were into him and when they weren't. "Is there someone else?"

"No," she lied convincingly, aware of the consequences should anyone start sniffing on her trail – and work out who she was seeing. "Please, can't we just go back to being friends?"

"Screw you," he spat, and walked off.

Needless to say, no-one understood what had possessed her to break it off with Charlie. "He's a total babe," Amanda protested indignantly. "How could you break up with him?"

"I wasn't attracted to him," Tonks said, which was true enough, but Amanda looked at her as though she'd gone completely bonkers. How could you not be attracted to Charlie Weasley?

"People don't understand," she complained to Lupin the next day. "Even Professor Sprout wanted to know why I did it. It's like even _she_ doesn't think we'll ever have anyone of our own to glorify so we may as well latch on to someone from another house that someone's dating."

"Actually I think that Diggory kid in third year has potential to be a good Quidditch player," Lupin joked. If a person's flying ability was based on how dizzy they could make him feel, then Cedric was well on his way.

"That's not funny, Remus. I wanted to talk to you."

"Well, I don't much like talking about your ex," he griped. "Don't you have a girlfriend you can talk to?"

"No, they all think I'm an idiot for dumping Charlie."

Lupin sighed. He resigned himself to the fact he wasn't going to get much action in the few hours in this afternoon that they had together. He supposed it was part of being a boyfriend. "OK, I'm listening."

"I have a right to date who I want – or not," she said. "If I'm not attracted to Charlie then that's no-one's business but mine."

"I wish I'd never kissed you," he admitted. "Maybe if I hadn't –"

"I still liked you way more than Charlie. Remember Christmas?" she asked. He nodded. "I couldn't sleep that night because of it. And I think I was developing feelings for you long before. It's just kind of happened, Remus. There's no one incident that you can say you wish you hadn't done and then none of this would have happened."

When she could be so wise and logical like that, it reminded him of why he had fallen for her in the first place. She certainly wasn't like other girls he age. Actually, he was hard-pressed to think of _any_ woman who was like her. "Easy for you to say," he complained good-naturedly. "People find out about us and the worse you'll get is a talking-to from your parents."

"I won't just get a talking-to from my parents, Remus," she said with a small giggle. She crawled on top of him and he grunted.

"Christ, you're a little minx, you know that," he said. He grabbed a fistful of her head and pulled her head towards his so he could kiss her. He murmured contentedly when she pushed her tongue into his mouth. What was it about her that he was putting his job on the line for her? And if he ever slept with her; and he _did_ want to sleep with her.

He grunted when she tentatively slid her hand down to his crotch. He was trying not to put any pressure on her, which wasn't exactly easy, and he knew it wasn't a line he could cross anyway – not that he hadn't been crossing lines in the first place. "Dora, stop it," he said weakly. "We can't. I told you, I could be tried for it. It's an Azkaban offense – and they will put me in Azkaban over it." He had no doubt that he would not get off lightly were he to sleep with her while she was a student. He was a werewolf, she was a Black, even if her mother was a Black-in-exile, a court would love to get a pound of flesh out of him for thinking he had a right to do it. If he was just involved with her, pretty much all Dumbledore could do was fire him, which was bad enough, but sleeping with her would be a whole other line...

"I'm not going to have sex with you, Remus," she told him. "You made _that_ pretty clear. I just thought I could make you happy." She rubbed her hand against his penis experimentally and he groaned. Why could her inexperienced touch do so much more to him that the touch of the most seasoned prostitute? He had a feeling it was more than just the length of time since he had been with a woman. "Tell me what to do," she urged him.

"What you should do is leave," he protested weakly.

"Tell me what you would rather have me do," she countered. She rubbed her hand against him harder, more confident, and enjoyed feeling him grow hard under her touch. "Is this OK?" she asked him. "You won't get into trouble for this?"

He laughed ironically at that. _Trouble_? He would already be in trouble if anyone found out what they were up to. "Oh, sweet Merlin, that feels good," he cried out when she applied pressure in just the right spot. He grabbed her hair again to kiss her and then flipped them over so he was on top and, hiking her skirt up, ran his fingers along her thighs until she was as worked up as he was and slipped them inside her panties.

"_Remus!_" she cried out as he began fingering her. She began rubbing him in earnest through his pants. She made a motion to unbutton them but he swatted her hand away, feeling more secure if he had his pants on... especially with her warm, wet womanhood pulsating around his fingers.

He fingered her to an orgasm while she rubbed her hand against his crotch. Arching his back, bucking up against her, he climaxed with a drawn-out moan, his seed spilling out through his pants, creating a wet patch that would be embarrassing when he got his wits about him in a few minutes. He collapsed against her, breathing heavily. "Remus, heavy," she complained after a few minutes.

"Sorry." He wriggled off her and lay beside her. He wished he had more restraint and trusted himself to take her to the bedroom. But – "Shouldn't have done that," he mumbled.

"Why? Will you get into trouble?" she asked.

"No more than just seeing you in the first place. I have to – well, what I just did doesn't count. I just feel like I'm getting closer and closer to that line."

"I won't let you cross it," she said. She curled up against him. "Remus, what happens next year?" she asked.

"Next year?"

"When I finish school, there's only three months left of the year you know."

Three months. Three lousy little months, if he'd been able to keep his hands off her for three lousy little months then this would be a hell of a lot easier. He would still cop flak for being involved with someone so much younger from such an old family, but no-one would question his intentions or any malign influence he was exerting over her. Why hadn't that occurred to him a few weeks ago? "You get your own place and I'll see you when I can," he said.

She made a face. "That's worse than what we have now."

"What we have now is a few makeout sessions when we can snatch a few hours together. Least that way I can spend the whole weekend with you. And you can't stay here. There'll be no place for you in the dorms and Dumbledore won't let you stay with me. Hey, what did Sprout say when you did your Careers advice in fifth year?"

"She said I'd make a damn good Auror if I can learn to be less clumsy."

He snorted derisively at that. Tonks learning to be less clumsy was about on the same level of likelihood as him learning to fly like Charlie Weasley. And yet – she had the brain and personality for it, and she was strong in the subjects she needed to qualify. "You do know the Office hasn't taken anyone new on in a few years?" he asked. "Although your mum should have the influence to swing something."

"But... I won't see as much of you. I know what you just said, but – at least this way I get to see you every day."

"Do you have a better solution?" he asked testily. She squirmed in his arms as way of saying _no_. "I didn't mean to be short with you," he said contritely "I'd love to have you stay with me. I'd love to be able to live openly with you. But it's not a possibility right now. You knew that when you got involved with me."

"Yeah, I know."

"And besides, once you get your own place, when I can see you on the weekends, I can spend the _whole_ weekend with you," he pointed out. "Including nights, we can spend the night together and we can wake up together and have breakfast together."

She propped herself up on one shoulder so she could look down at him. Her eyes sparkled at the prospect. "Really?" she asked.

"Would I promise you something like that if I couldn't deliver?"

"Hmm... maybe having my own place wouldn't be such a bad idea after all," she said, and Lupin was relieved that he had talked her around so quickly.

* * *

Tonks came to an abrupt halt when someone grabbed her arm. She was expecting it to be Charlie – he was taking their breakup badly and kept trying to talk her into a second chance – but she tensed up when she saw that it was actually Richard Malfoy. "What do you want?" she asked testily, reasonably confident that Richard wouldn't try anything again. Snape might have his favourites, but he had little tolerance for anyone who could bring a bad name to the Slytherin House. _Hope he really laid into you_, she thought viciously.

"I hear you broke up with Charlie Weasley," he said.

"Then you're even more behind on the gossip than I thought," she said snidely.

"Not man enough for you, huh?" he jeered.

"Far more of a man than someone who needs to forces unwanted attentions on a girl," she shot back. "Now kindly tell me what the hell you want or I'll tell Dumbledore that you're bothering me again."

"You're seeing someone else, aren't you?" he asked. "I can tell. You look like a lovesick puppy."

"Just happy to be almost out of here," she lied, panicking at the thought that her feelings were written on her face. Was Richard merely taking shots in the dark to try and get something out of her? Better play it cool, just to be safe. "If I was seeing someone, I certainly wouldn't be telling _you_." And with that she walked off before Richard could interrogate her anymore.

* * *

"You alright, love?" Lupin asked casually, although it was clear that she wasn't, or she wouldn't have made an unscheduled visit to his rooms looking flustered. She explained briefly what had happened. "He's probably just taking shots in the dark. But just to be on the safe side, I think we should see a little less of each other for the time being."

Tonks made a face. "But I don't _want_ to see less of you. I don't see enough of you as it is!"

"Dora, I did not fall for you for your ability to behave like a deprived child. Malfoy may be taking shots in the dark, but you may also have given yourself away inadvertently. It's for the best that we don't see each other for a while. Look," he said, softening his voice. "I'm not breaking up with you. I just think we need to take a step back until we can date openly. OK? OK?" he asked. She nodded reluctantly, and he was relieved that she backed down so quickly. "Come here," he said quietly. She was already here, so they may as well enjoy it, especially considering that with so little time left of the school year and exams coming up, it may very well be the last time they were alone together before the end of the year.

* * *

"You imbecile, what's going through that thick head of yours that you got her alone again? Don't you have _any_ of your uncle's brains? Honestly, I think that girl got more of the Malfoy intelligence by marriage than you did by blood," Snape raged at Malfoy when he went to share his suspicions that Tonks was seeing someone else.

"She's being all secretive, and she totally is seeing someone," Malfoy said sullenly.

"So? She can see someone if she likes."

"Then why would she keep it a secret? And how come she spends so much time skulking around the bottom floors?"

"Because her House is on the bottom floors. Imbecile," Snape repeated. If there was one thing he didn't like about the Malfoys, it was how entitled the lot of them were, to the point that there was a lot of resentment from less prominent families. It didn't really surprise him that this particular Malfoy had taken it upon himself to harass a half-blood and resent that the girl would choose to date someone else. Or that he was following her around trying to find out if she was seeing someone else.

And yet – she _had_ been spending a lot of times wandering the bottom floors of the castle – the section where the Hufflepuff and Slytherin Houses were located... as well as the Potions and DADA rooms, both the classrooms and Lupin's private rooms. Snape had noticed this himself and not given it a lot of thought. He knew there was a history between Lupin and the Tonks family that had led Lupin to meddle in Tonks's complaints about Malfoy. He was pretty sure her short-lived relationship with Charlie Weasley had been at Lupin's suggested so she would have a Quidditch Captain as a handy bodyguard.

But it had never occurred to even him that Lupin's interest in her might go further than as a friend of her parents.

"It's none of your business who she dates, and for the love of Merlin, _please_ leave the girl alone. Her mother will get involved with your aunt and uncle over it if you push it too far and Andromeda is far scarier than Narcissa."

He dismissed Malfoy, and made his way to Lupin's office. He had been resentful of the man for years, ever since James and Sirius had spent most of their time at Hogwarts making his life a misery. And then there had been the fact James had married Lily – his heart gave an uncomfortable squeeze to think about it. There had been something about James that all the girls loved – what, Snape didn't know, because the boy was good for nothing other than flaunting the rules and getting into trouble. Actually, all four of them had been good at that, although he'd had to concede that Lupin had excelled at several subjects. (Potions, he had thought gleefully, was not one of them.)

And it was rather typical of Lupin to still be flaunting the rules.

* * *

Lupin had pushed her shirt up and unhooked her bra, kissing her breasts as he rubbed against her thigh. He'd pushed her skirt up around her waist and had stripped down to his y-fronts. He grunted and groaned as he gyrated against her, his fingers moving inside her panties. "Remus!" she cried. "Remus, kiss me," she begged him. He obliged and shifted slightly so he could kiss her deeply, his tongue thrashing in her mouth, bringing his free hand up to her hair and bunching it in a fist, grateful that she didn't care if he was a little rough with her. OK, so a lot rough sometimes – but she didn't seem to mind that, either. With a final grunt, he thrust against her thigh again and climaxed, bringing her to her own orgasm.

"God, I can't wait to do this for real," he grunted. He was starting to feel like a horny teenage boy jerking off for lack of a partner.

"I can see that," came Severus Snape's voice from the door, his black eyes glittering with malicious glee.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five**

"Where is she? I want to see her!"

"You're hardly in a position to demand anything, let alone to see the student you've been dallying with," Dumbledore replied coolly. Lupin shrank under the obvious disapproval of his boss – and the only one who had ever given him a break despite his lycanthropy. He felt insanely guilty for betraying Dumbledore's trust like this. Any other Headmaster – God, what had he been thinking? And yet, when he was actually with her, he couldn't think of anything but how good he felt with her, how good she felt in his arms.

He cringed when he felt Dumbledore gently probing his mind. Even now, when he should be thoroughly contrite, his thoughts were wandering to her. "I'm sorry," he said.

"I can see that," Dumbledore said, the gentleness in his tone not discounting the severe disappointing that he was obviously feeling towards Lupin. "But that doesn't negate the fact you were caught almost naked with one of your students. How long has it been going on?"

There was no point in lying to Dumbledore. The man was an extremely talented Legilimens and if he tried to lie, it would only come back to bite him in the ass. "Two months," he said. "I never had sex with her," he added weakly.

"I can see that," Dumbledore repeated his former statement. "But you wanted to."

"Yes," he admitted.

"At least you showed _some_ judgement."

"Where is she?" Lupin asked again, this time more quietly, less demanding.

"With Professor Snape."

His hackles were immediately raised. Snape had never liked him, stemming back to their time as students and then the fact he had taken the job Snape had his heart set on, and while he had no issue with Tonks – well, not beyond his usual dislike for students other than his own, an odd trait for a teacher to possess – Lupin had no doubt that he'd use her to take whatever revenge on Lupin that he could extract out of there. "Why?" he asked, more demanding this time.

"He thought it was best if he ascertained her – shall we say – purity," Dumbledore said.

For a second, Lupin stared at him. There were a dozen charms that could be used to prove that she was still a virgin, something he had been banking on if the worst should happen – which it had – and they were found out. But Charms was Flitwick's area of expertise, not Snape's. In fact, Lupin recalled Snape having a certain degree of contempt for Charms, feeling it was a 'light' subject and not as important as DADA and Potions. Of course, there were also plenty of potions that could be used on her for the same thing, but a Charm was less invasive than a Potion and besides, Lupin suspected that wasn't actually what Snape was planning on doing. "You cannot be serious!" he objected. "You cannot let him use Legilimency on her! There's no need to! Use me, if you have to. Or better yet, hand her over to Flitwick."

"Professor Snape is of the opinion that Miss Tonks is strong enough in Counter-Charms to throw Professor Flitwick off the scent... or at least muddy the waters a little," Dumbledore said. "And I'm inclined to agree."

Actually, so was Lupin – not that Tonks would use her talent in Counter-Charms to throw Flitwick off the scent, because there was no need to, but that she had the _ability_ to do so. "That's just his excuse to invade her mind," Lupin said. "Please. Let him do it on me. He can get the exact same information out of me. It's me he's got a grudge against anyway."

"You're in no position to negotiate," Dumbledore told him. "Remus – what on earth possessed you? I know you're very fond of her, but I recall specifically asking you if your history with her would interfere with your ability to teach her," he reminded his former student gently.

"I know you did. I didn't mean for it to happen. I just – really like being around her. I always did. She's one of the few people who never gave a crap about my condition. I should have said something when we were getting too close. I should have never allowed her to get so close."

"At least you're not trying to pin the blame on her," Dumbledore said grudgingly. "Oh, you're not the first teacher to get involved with a student. Why do you think I made it an Azkaban offense for a Professor to have sexual relations with a student?"

"What happens now?" Lupin asked.

"It's not fair for your students to lose a Professor this close to the end-of-year exams," Dumbledore said. "After that, I expect you to resign quietly. I highly doubt Ted and Andromeda will be keen to have this become public knowledge so you may very well be able to leave quietly without anyone knowing the reason why. Merlin knows we've had enough DADA Professors pass through these doors in the last twenty years that you can give any flimsy excuse and no-one will question your departure. I believe Professor Quirrel expressed an interest in the position," he said idly. He wondered what Snape would say to discover that his successful attempt to oust a DADA Professor hadn't actually gotten him the position.

"And Dora?"

"I'll leave that up to her parents. I expect they'll want her to see out the rest of the year being home-schooled. I can't imagine they'll want her in the same building as you."

"I have to see her," Lupin pressed. "Please," he pleaded. "You don't know her like I do – she'll get distressed if I don't at least say goodbye to her."

"That's up to her parents."

Lupin knew there was no point in begging – and he knew that he had gotten away relatively lightly. He cursed himself for giving into his attraction and feelings for Tonks... and yet he couldn't bring himself to regret it. When he thought about the way she smiled at him, the way she smelled, the way she didn't give a crap about his lycanthropy or his scars or how rough he could get with her, he could feel his heart aching. And for her to be in the hands of Severus Snape, who would take delight in screwing with her out of his stupid schoolboy grudge...

* * *

"_Stop it!_" Tonks screamed shrilly. "You know perfectly well that we didn't do it!" She braced herself for Snape to penetrate her mind again. She knew it was absolutely futile and was only furthering her humiliation as he went through her memories, trying to find proof that she and Lupin had never slept together when he knew full well that there were half a dozen Charms that would have proven she was still a virgin, but she couldn't help herself. Her moments with Lupin were private, and the idea of Snape perusing through them like he was watching a porno sickened and humiliated her. She resisted as much as she could, shaking with the effort, but even as she did, she could feel those memories coming to the forefront, ever kiss, every caress, every intimate moment that no-one but the two of them should have shared. As Snape penetrate her mind, searching out the memories pertaining to Lupin, one came to the forefront...

"_I don't know why he hates you so much," she said to him._

"_It goes back to this stupid schoolboy prank of Sirius's. That and he's convinced that James poached Lily from him, as if Lily was ever interested in a greasy, surly Death Eater." Lupin laughed contemptuously as the idea, and she had agreed with him. She had barely known Lily Evans-Potter, but what she had known had been of a kind woman who was sensitive about her muggle-born status and would never be interested in a Death-Eater who hid the fact that he was only a half-blood..._

She had what she needed to make him back off. It was little-known – Lupin might very well be the only person alive and not in prison who knew of Snape's crush on Lily, at least before he had shared it with Tonks – and that he still harboured feelings for the dead woman. Shaking her head defiantly as soon as she felt Snape's Legilimency attack ease up, she turned her hair to auburn and her eyes green, rearranging her facial features to match those in one of the photos Lupin kept in his rooms. Lily wouldn't have been much older than she was now, so it wasn't that hard. "Let's see you torture the woman you claim to love," she sneered, knowing instinctively that it was the one means she had of gaining the upper hand over him.

It worked. Snape actually dropped his wand at the shock of seeing Lily – or at least of a metamophmagus posing as Lily to taunt him. "Stop it!" he yelled at her. "Change back!"

"Make me," she said, thinking it was only a pity that she didn't have a voice to match the face. Watching the forceful, resolute Snape rattled so clearly was almost _fun_. "C'mon, you called her a mudblood enough times, what's a little Legilimency? Hell might have helped you realise that you were wasting your time," she spat hatefully. If he wanted to torture her, then she could return the favour.

"Stop it!" Snape screamed at her.

Dumbledore made his appearance then. "Miss Tonks, what in Merlin's name do you think you are doing?" he asked, knowing exactly what she was doing and a little impressed that she had come up with such a cruel way to lash out at Snape in return for the invasion of her mind."Severus, stop it. Have you found anything or are you just enjoying perusing through her mind?"

"Nothing," Snape admitted. Not that he had expected to find anything. Trust Lupin to go right to the edge of an Azkaban offense without actually going it. But at least he would be leaving at the end of the year.

"Then you can go. Miss Tonks, your parents will be here to pick you up soon and in the meantime, it's best that you stay here."

"I want to see Remus."

"That's for your parents to decide."

Her heart fell. She had known he would say that. Her parents would never let her see him, once they found out the reason they had been called in. In fact, she doubted they would even let her stay at Hogwarts.

Dutifully, she changed her look back to her natural one – medium brown hair and brown eyes, s_o_ boring. Not that it really mattered now, she thought. She stared out the window, thinking about Lupin. Every kiss, every caress – even when he was rough, she had still enjoyed it. And when she would curl up in his arms and exchange stories about their lives... she released a sob to think about the fact she didn't know when she would see him again. "You can't keep him from me!" she said hotly.

"He agrees this is for the best. What happens in the future, I don't know," Dumbledore said philosophically. "He should have been able to contain himself."

"He didn't do anything! It was all me! He told me he could get into trouble for it but I kept pursuing it and-"

"In which case, he should have said something to me, or at least Professor Sprout."

Tonks went quiet at that. She knew why Lupin hadn't done exactly that. He hadn't wanted to get her into trouble or himself for allowing her to get so close to him in the first place. If he'd had to explain the odd intimacy they'd shared over Christmas, or the amount of times he had her in his rooms, drinking... "What's going to happen to him?" she asked.

"He'll resign at the end of the year. What happens after that is up to you and your parents." She started to cry again because she knew that her parents would never allow her to keep seeing him, at least not while she was living under their room, and not without any approval from them. She wished now that she had listened to him when he'd try to explain how much this could cost him – both of them. She wished now she had waited until she'd had a place of her own and he could see her as he wished.

* * *

"You stupid girl! What were you thinking? You should have come to us straight away when he started showing an interest in you! That – _predator!_" Andromeda raged, immediately forgetting that Lupin had once been a good friend of hers.

"He's not a predator, mum, I wanted it as much as he did – maybe more. I pushed him into it," Tonks said, remembering guiltily how he had told her to go away and forget what had happened between them and she had pushed him to give into what he felt. He had been right to call her a privileged teenager, not thinking beyond what _she_ wanted. And now she'd gotten him fired and she didn't know when she would see him again. She wanted to cry at the thought.

Andromeda noticed the look on her face; she looked like a teenager who'd been deprived what she wanted most – at least, what she wanted most that very second. She didn't know who to blame more for what had happened, her daughter or Lupin.

"You are to stay in your room," she ordered Tonks. "I'll have you home-school for the rest of the year." Thank Merlin, her marks were exceptionally high – she had consistently been top of her class for seven years – and she could afford to miss out on the first-class education that she had received at Hogwarts. _As well as a different sort of education_, she thought, furious.

"I need to see him!" she objected.

Andromeda slapped her at that. "I want you to think about what you've done – what you let him do to you. You know that no man would be interested in you if they knew what had happened? No man would believe that you didn't actually sleep with him."

"I WISH I HAD!" she screamed at her mother.

Andromeda slapped her again. "You say that again and I will throw you out and you can fend for yourself," she said, regretting the words as soon as she had said them because it was what her own father had done to her for _her_ taste in men – or _man_, singular. And she went to Hogwarts to visit her wrath upon the man who had seduced her little girl.

* * *

Lupin sprung to his feet the second he saw Andromeda, wand raised defensively, hoping that he was a match for her. "Can't say I'm surprised to see you," he said.

"You have some nerve," she spat at him. "If you were any kind of decent human being you'd leave straight away before you corrupted anymore impressionable students. But I forgot," she jeered, "you're not a human and you're not decent."

"Andromeda, if I thought it would do any good, I would leave right now. But I can't leave all my students in the lurch."

She laughed at that. "Bit late for you to be developing teacherly concern for your students, isn't it?" She pushed her wand directly against his heart. "You still got one, freak?" she asked.

"My heart's in the same place everyone else's is," Lupin said. "Andromeda, I didn't mean for this to happen."

"So you're blaming her now, are you?"

"Of course not, get that away from me Andromeda. You're not going to do yourself any good if you try to kill me."

Andromeda lowered her want. "I hate you for what you did to her," she hissed.

"I wasn't the one who used Legilimency on her," Lupin said, then couldn't resist adding, "I believe _you_ were his Head Girl in first year." Head Girls were supposed to exude a certain benign influence over their students; unfortunately Andromeda had been at best half-hearted towards the values of Slytherin while at the time secretly involved with a muggle-born from Hufflepuff, and she hadn't paid much attention to the amount of Dark Arts that had been being practiced under her nose.

"Shut up, Remus. You come near her again and I swear to God, I'll kill you."

"Then you'd better keep her away from me, because if she throws herself at me again, I won't restrain myself."

"Is _that_ what you think you were doing?" Andromeda asked coolly, but she figured she wasn't achieving anything here and left, her head high and haughty as she did.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six**

_1993_ (Harry's third year, in which Lupin makes his first canon appearance)

"How are things going for you?" Dumbledore asked Lupin a few years later.

Lupin smiled ironically. "Fine, as you can see," he said. He got by, but he would always live shabbily thanks to people's fear of werewolves. Dumbledore had been one of the few who had trusted him. He smiled ironically again, this time somewhat bitterly. And he had blown it for something that had nothing to do with his lycanthropy – except in the sense that Tonks had been the first woman he'd known who didn't give a crap about his werewolf status. "I take it you've struck out with your DADA Professor again?" Hogwart's inability to hold onto its DADA Professors was becoming notorious. Lupin knew there had been at least ten before him, none lasting more than one school year, and both his two successors had lasted no more than that, either.

"Gilderoy Lockhart suffered an unfortunate memory loss," he said. "One of his spells backfired and hit him."

"Never thought much of the guy, no-one can do all he's claimed to... and have so much free time left to spend promoting his exploits."

Now it was Dumbledore's turn to smile ironically. Remus Lupin had been, without a doubt, the most knowledgeable DADA Professor Hogwarts had known in some time – certainly in his time as Headmaster. It was such a shame that he had thrown it away to get involved with that girl... although maybe he had enjoyed a better fate than his two successors; one dead, the other's brain addled. "I'd like you to come back," he said. "But first some provisos"

"You want to know if I'm going to get involved with another student," Lupin offered.

"The thought did occour to me," Dumbledore said laconically. "But something tells me your feels were for one particular student. Have you seen her?" he asked, even though he already knew the answer.

"No. I tried to get in touch with her – not that hard, I must admit."

"You saved yourself a fair bit of effort. When a Black wants their daughter to disappear..."

Lupin nodded. He was grateful for that. His promise, or had it been a threat? – Not to be so restrained around Tonks once she was no longer his student had not been an idle one. He realised now the futility of such a dream of her having her own job, her own place that he could visit as he wished, openly and without shame... because even as an adult independent of her family's home and money, he would still be too old, too poor, too dangerous for her...

"It wasn't that she was a student. It was that she was _her_. There was no-one else like her. There was no-one who could smile like that, who made me feel the way she did. You could parade all the seventeen-year-olds in the world at me. They wouldn't interest me." The only one, who would interest him, he knew, was now twenty and no doubt surrounded by adoring men...

Dumbledore nodded. It had been what he was expecting to hear. He'd never doubted that Lupin's relationship with Tonks had been the result of poor judgement but genuine feelings. You didn't need to be a Legilimens to know that he had been deeply in love with her, and was still in love with her. He had spent most of his life used to the fact that he would have to do without the luxuries of life because of his lack of employment opportunities... but now he had had a taste of love and the happiness it brought, and lost it, and seemed even shabbier and tired because of it.

"I would like you to come back," he said. "On the proviso, of course, that you don't get inappropriately involved with a student again."

"What about Snape? He made it clear he wants the job."

"I have my reasons for not giving Severus the position he wants," Dumbledore said vaguely. "Do you want the position or not, because if you decline, I need to look for someone else."

"No, I'll take it," Lupin said, eager for the respectability and decent pay that teaching would bring – not to mention that he had genuinely enjoyed teaching.

"Good. I shall see you there at the beginning of term. Oh, and Remus? You'll have five Weasleys on your hands this time – Percy, the twins, and the two youngest, Ron and Ginny."

* * *

"Sir? You taught my brother, didn't you?" Ron Weasley asked Lupin shortly into the new school year. Lupin nodded. "He really liked you, said you were the best DADA teacher he'd had."

"It does seem to be a little difficult getting decent Professors," Lupin agreed. Quirrel had been an agent for Voldemort and Lockhart had lost his mind. Lupin wondered what would happen to _him_ if it became known that he was a werewolf.

"Why did you leave?"

_Because I got caught dry-humping a student_, Lupin thought. "Personal reasons," he said, making it clear that that was the end of the discussion.

He enjoyed being back teaching – although naturally, there was still a Malfoy to contend with. He didn't know who was worse, Draco or Richard – they were certainly both arrogant, racist, entitled brats. And of course there was the pleasure of teaching Harry Potter. He was James all over again – his looks, his nature, even his flying ability.

* * *

"You look so much like your father, you know. Except –"

"I have my mother's eyes, I know," Harry said. He had liked the professor immediately. Lupin cared little for bloodlines or even ability, believing that even the worst of Squibs could flourish with the right attention and encouragement.

Snape, however, was just as unbearable as always. His resentment towards Lupin seemed only to have increased in the last two years – Lupin suspected that resentment increased every year that he was passed over for the DADA position. Snape must have been delighted to see the back of him – except now he was back again, in the Job Snape himself had been hankering over for more than a decade.

He supposed he should be more grateful. For the second time Snape faithfully made his Wolfsbane potion. He knew the ingredients and processes himself, but no-one had a knack for potions like Severus Snape.

Snape dropped by the potion one afternoon. "I have a whole cauldron full, should you need it," he said in that silky, snarky voice that always set Lupin's nerves on edge; it usually meant that a verbal sucker punch would follow.

"Thank you, I'll take you up on that," Lupin said.

"Have you heard from a certain metamophmagus lately?" he asked silkily.

"I haven't seen her since – well, I'm sure you remember the last time I saw her," Lupin said. His heart lurched painfully to think of Tonks. He had made no attempt to contact her for her own good, but that didn't mean he hadn't thought about her. He couldn't believe how strong a bond they had formed over such a short period of time. "Stop it," he growled when he felt Snape nosying around in his head, and knew that his emotions had shown up on his face.

"She's done very well for herself, works for the Aurors," Snape said, determined to bait Lupin.

"Good for her."

"You got up to quite a bit, didn't you?" Snape asked. "The things I saw –"

Lupin growled at that. "You sick bastard, you enjoyed violating her, didn't you? Tell me, Severus, did you do it just to get back at me, or do you get your jollies out of hurting innocent women? I hear you rather enjoyed doing just that back in the good old days."

He saw Snape briefly go pale – well, paler than usual – and knew he had git the mark. He wondered if Snape genuinely regretted his actions as a Death Eater or he just didn't want to be reminded of them. "I've paid my debt to society," he said. "It wasn't my fault that Black betrayed Lily."

"_James_ and Lily," Lupin corrected. "She married, remember?" Snape glowered at that. "And I didn't do anything wrong. She was overage."

"She was a student."

"Whom one of _your_ students assaulted."

"I have to question his taste...especially since the girl in question would rather be pawed by a werewolf."

Lupin stiffened first at the crass references, and then to see Harry at the door. "Harry, dear boy, is there something you wanted?"

"I'll get out of your hair," Snape said silkily. "_Do_ think over what we talked about." And with that he turned on his heel and walked out the door, his black cape billowing behind him.

"What was that about?" Harry asked when he caught up with his Professor later. He had left when Snape had entered the room – both out of respect for Lupin's professional relationships and the fact that the less time he spent with Snape, the better.

"Just an old issue between us, it stems back to when we were students."

"Was he as much of a jerk then as he is now?"

"You shouldn't speak so disrespectfully about a Professor, Harry," Lupin chided him gently. He took a sip of his Wolfsbane and made a face. He wondered if Snape deliberately made it so revolting, or it was just a side-effect of this particular potion. "You may not like him personally, but he's a damn brilliant Potions master and you could learn a lot from him."

Harry nodded contritely. "Tell me about dad," he urged Lupin, eager to get off what was clearly an uncomfortable subject. He always loved hearing Lupin talk about his father when he had been Harry's age.

Lupin smiled indulgently at his young charge. He was immensely fond of Harry, and sometimes let his thoughts wander to the fantasy of having such a boy of his own. He knew he would have made a good father, if not for his debilitating condition. Though sometimes such thoughts made him miss Tonks even more.

* * *

"I can't believe they're firing you for being a werewolf!" Harry cried indignantly, as if Lupin's condition were no more a concern than the fact he had green eyes. "You're not dangerous."

Lupin smiled bitterly. "But I am, Harry. Last night proved that. I could have killed you, or worse, turned you. It's best if I not be around students. But I hope you and I can keep in touch... when it's _not_ the full moon."

"I'd like that." Harry paused before launching into something that had clearly been on his mind. "Sir? Can I ask you something?"

"Of course."

"Is it true that you were involved with a student? Charlie Weasley's ex?"

Lupin inhaled deeply. On seven people had ever known about that – him and Tonks, her parents, Sprout, Dumbledore and Snape. Only one person was cruel enough and had anything to gain by letting it slip – the same way he had let his lycanthropy slip.

_Severus Snape._

Harry was waiting for a reply. "Yes, I was," he admitted. "We were in love," he added when he saw the look of disappointment on Harry's face, and it was like he was disappointing his own son. "She was the first woman who knew what I was and didn't care." His voice broke to think of her and the way she would smile at him and the way she felt in his arms...

"Why couldn't you wait?" Harry asked.

"I should have. Harry, I don't mean to belittle you, but you don't understand how I felt about her. She was the first person who made me feel like I was loveable since I was bitten."

In the shock of finding out that his beloved Professor was actually a werewolf, Harry hadn't thought about how isolating it was for the man. He thought about what it would be like to know that most people were frightened, even disgusted by him, to know that you could never have the kind of family that most people took for granted... "Do you ever see her?" Harry asked.

"No. It's for the best. I couldn't be the kind of man that she deserves, anyway."

"Do you miss her?"

"More than I can say."

After Lupin had packed up all his possessions, there was just one more thing to do. He made his way to Snape's office. He understood Snape's bitterness at being constantly passed over for the DADA position, but to out his relationship with Tonks – there had been no need to drag her name through the mud like that. It would have been enough to get him fired with no hope of returning had he just outed Lupin as a werewolf.

But no, he had to let it slip that he was a sexual predator who had a thing for his students. _Student, _he thought. _Singular_. But no-one would believe that, and no-one would trust him around their kids. It would be hard to say what people thought was the worst of the two offenses; that he was a werewolf or that he had gotten involved with a student. Whatever it was, Snape had dragged Tonks's name through the mud out of a lust for revenge. It was something she would never live down, to have been involved with a werewolf. _I'm so sorry, love_, he thought mentally.

Snape didn't look surprised to see him. "Remus," he said silkily, smugly.

"_You... shit,_" Lupin spat. "It wasn't enough for you to get me fired again, was it? You had to drag Dora's name through the mud, too. You know she'll be _ruined_. No man will want to touch her now that they think she's been with a werewolf."

"She _has_ been with a werewolf," Snape said. "I don't see how you can blame me for that. I didn't throw her into your arms."

"I didn't have sex with her, which you damn well know. Though it's closer than _you've_ ever gotten, I'm sure," he added. "Maybe _that's_ what this is about. It kills you that I'm a werewolf and I can get someone to love me... where Lily couldn't stand you by the end, could she?"

"_Shut up_," Snape hissed.

"Oh, _now_ you want to keep quiet?" Lupin sneered. "_I_ was closer to Lily then you were ever going to be... and that kills you."

"I said... _shut up!_" Snape yelled at Lupin, finally losing his cool. He whipped out his wand and sent a burning curse in Lupin's direction; Lupin, with the reflexes of an animal, dodged it and fired his own curse back. He was done trying to be civil towards Snape; he wanted vengeance, vengeance for his lost job and tarnished name, vengeance for the way he'd dragged Tonks's through the mud out of some twisted desire for payback.

"What in Merlin's name is going on?" Professor McGonagall asked, walking in on the two wizards engaging in what was little more dignified than a schoolboy tussle. Harry had let it slip that he'd asked Lupin about Tonks, and she had thought it was best to intervene before the two men ripped each other apart. "Remus, I thought I taught you better than that."

"Sorry," Lupin said, only sorry that he had disappointed yet someone else – his former House Head.

"I think it's best if you leave," McGonagall said with quiet forcefulness.

"Fine," Lupin said, pocketing his wand and stalking out the dungeon. He knew he would never get as good a job as he'd had as a Professor at Hogwarts, but right now, he didn't care. All he could think about was Tonks and how much he had loved her – how much he still loved her – and how he had to keep his distance for her own good.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven**

_1995_

Lupin flinched slightly at the force of Molly Weasley's Death Stare in the kitchen of Grimmauld Place. Not that he blamed Molly for not being pleased to see him – he had taught six of her children, and been responsible for Tonks and Charlie breaking up.

"Molly, this is still my place," Sirius said with quiet force when Molly sent Lupin a particularly filthy glare. "And he's not responsible for them breaking up."

"Well, actually –" Lupin started, but shut up when Sirius sent him a glare of his own. _Can't you see I'm trying to help you_? Sirius's look said. _Can't you see that she's determined to hate me?_ Lupin's look said back. Lupin turned to Molly. "I'm sorry that I got involved with her. But her relationship with Charlie was never going to work. She was only with him at my instigation, I thought she needed protection."

"I see you've done an excellent job of protecting her," Molly said sarcastically."I hear she has trouble maintaining a relationship – no-one wants to be with her now."

"Now _that_ wasn't my fault." He was still furious with Snape for outing their relationship and had been reluctant to join the order if it meant working with the man again. But Dumbledore had given him yet another chance, and Lupin would have felt obliged to take it, even if it _wasn't_ something that he felt so strongly about. He had been part of the original order and jumped at the excuse to join the reformed one.

"Well, you can tell her that yourself," Sirius piped up. Lupin recognised that look in his eyes – that fiendish, scheming look, like he had something up in his sleeve... something that he knew Lupin wouldn't be entirely happy with.

"What do you mean?" he asked, knowing he wasn't going to like it. Sirius mumbled something about the fact Grimmauld Place was his house meant that he was able to invite whoever he liked there; the laws of the Secret Keeper – namely, that anyone who wasn't one, in this case, Dumbledore, couldn't invite people to join the order – didn't apply to Sirius. "SIRIUS BLACK!" Lupin yelled, losing his temper for one of the first times in his life. "YOU INVITED THAT GIRL TO JOIN THE ORDER!"

"I may have mentioned it – and she may have insisted that I get her in," Sirius offered innocently.

"_May have?_ You went behind my back, you scheming shit!" Lupin yelled. Molly went quiet, Lupin's display of temper actually more impressive than hers once she got worked up. The twins stopped what they were doing and watched in interest; sixteen years of their mother had developed in them a keen interest in people's tempers, so long as that temper wasn't directed at _them_.

"Behind your back? I'm sorry, _when_ did you tell me you didn't want her to be part of the Order? You know perfectly well how valuable Aurors are."

"I shouldn't have had to! I would have thought someone with your so-called intellect would know better! Or did Azkaban fry your brain?"

If it was possible, the room went even more deadening silence at that comment. They didn't talk about Sirius's stint in Azkaban; it was an awful enough place for those who deserved to be there, let alone those false accused. "That," Sirius said coolly, "is _way_ below the belt."

"So is inviting her! _Anyone_ but her, Sirius," Lupin said, his anger fading slightly as nerves set in. He hadn't seen her in five years, intentionally on his part – he hadn't tried to find her and he had made it difficult for her to find him, should she get it in her head to do so. It was easy enough for werewolves to slip off the radar; the only time he had been on it in the last five years was when he had returned to Hogwarts, and he had been secure in the fact that Dumbledore wouldn't be allowing her on the grounds.

"I don't see why you're so upset, Remus," Sirius said with a grin, and too late Lupin realised Sirius had led him into a trap. "You haven't seen her in five years."

"Screw you," Lupin said, stomping off towards the stairs.

"Where are you going?"

"To pack, I'm leaving."

"You can't leave!" Sirius objected. "You'll break the security shields if a member leaves!"

"You should have thought about that before you invited her. Merlin, Sirius," Lupin said in a quiet voice now that the two men were far enough away from everyone else that he could speak with some degree of honesty about the depth of his feelings. "There's hardly a day that goes by that I don't think about her. I didn't think I needed to spell out how I felt for you to realise that I wouldn't have gotten involved with just anyone."

"So you did love her?" Sirius asked a grin on his face at having so easily tricked his friend into revealing his feelings.

"Shut up, Sirius. I won't stay here and I don't care how you sugar-coat it, you knew damn well that I didn't want to see her again."

Sirius yawned theatrically. "Are you going to start up on your 'too old, too poor, too dangerous' claptrap again?" he asked. "Because she doesn't care."

Lupin eyed him suspiciously. "Has she said something? Have you spoken to her about it?" he asked. Trust Sirius to meddle in his private business; Sirius had been as open about his opinions and his personal life as Lupin had been private, even secretive. Sirius genuinely didn't care of his friend's condition, but neither did he understand that others _did_. And now his meddling had put Lupin in a very uncomfortable position. "Give Dumbledore my apologies," he said.

"Why? You going somewhere?" said a voice that Lupin would never have forgotten. He took a deep breath when he locked eyes with Tonks. She looked even better as a twenty-two-year-old than she had as a seventeen-year-old, more mature, more filled out... and yet sadder. He wondered how much grief she had come to after Snape had blabbed about their relationship.

"I –" he started to say, but words were lost somewhere between his brain and his mouth. Come to think of it, his brain wasn't working too well, either. All he could focus on was her bright pink hair and flashing green eyes – he wondered if it was a compliment to him that she had chosen that colour. Though he'd heard she'd also taken to adopting Lily's auburn hair and green eyes and a way of making Snape uncomfortable, so maybe he was reading too much into it. Either way – she looked good. She looked sadder, but that gave her a degree of vulnerability that was no longer disguised by her brash bravado. "I – you look good," was all he could manage to say.

And without either of them knowing exactly how it had happened, she was in his arms and they were kissing and her hands were in his hair, her fingers fisting his locks and yanking on them, feeling the texture of his hair, whimpering against his rough, demanding kiss. He wrapped his arms around her waist tightly; drawing her into him, wishing there was somehow he could defy the laws of physics and gravity and pull her closer to him than was humanly possible.

He lowered his hands to her hips, grabbed them and lifted her up so she could wrap her legs around his waist, much like their first kiss – or had that been their second? He couldn't remember – all he could think about was how damn good she felt in his arms, like she belonged there, and he couldn't for the life of him how he could ever have survived with kissing her, without seeing her every day...

"Dora," he moaned into her mouth, momentarily completely unaware of the fact that they had an audience – Molly disapproving, the twins shocked in a pleased way, as if they'd just discovered their brother Percy was capable of such passion, Sirius grinning pleasedly. While he had hoped that the two of them being in the Order would force them to talk to one another, he had never expected their chemistry to literally push them into each other's arms like this.

Tonks rubbed her chest against his and tightened the hold her legs had on his waist, as much for support as to turn him on. The effect was instantaneous; he felt himself go hard and became vaguely aware of their audience. "Dora, get down," he whispered huskily. She slid down his body. "Keep hold of me," he directed. "I'm going to Appirated us into my room." She nodded, keeping her arms around his neck, and he transported them into his room.

"Wow, way to go Professor Lupin!" George said.

"George! She was your brother's ex!" Molly admonished him.

Fred shrugged, as usual thinking the exact same thing as his twin. "She never seemed that interested in him, and we kept telling the git that," he said. "Hell, maybe if he'd ever seen what we just saw, he would have realised that."

"Someone ought to do something!" Molly said indignantly. "Her parents will be so angry!"

"Yeah, well, they can be angry at me if they like," Sirius said dismissively. He was used to people being angry at him. "And if you want to do something about it, Molly, I'd say you have about half a second before Lupin puts an Imperturbable Charm on the door... ooops, too late."

"Fine," Molly said, grumbling. "I'm going to call Dumbledore."

"You do that," Sirius said cheerfully. "He's not going to get here in time to stop anything, and he wouldn't even if he did."

* * *

"I've missed you so much. There's barely been a day that I haven't thought about you," Lupin said huskily. His hands were everywhere, trying to take in her skin, her hair, her smell, five years of her that he had missed out on – five long, lonely years that – "Ahhhh, that's not playing fair," he complained when she brought her hands up his back under his shirt. He retaliated by ripping her shirt clean through and tossing the torn material on the floor. "You're curvier than I remember," he drawled approvingly.

"If I'd known you liked it, I would have done it for you," she said impishly. Somehow, it wasn't the same when she changed her image to suit Lupin's liking than when other boys wanted her to do the same for him.

"You know I don't like it when you change your appearance to suit someone else's tastes," he said. "Besides, maybe I just prefer it because it means you're twenty-two and not seventeen."

She smiled lovingly at him. _That_ was exactly why she didn't mind changing her appearance for him – because he didn't want her to. She flung his arms around her neck and started kissing him again. "Remus, I have to tell you something," she murmured hesitantly when he lowered her onto his bed and they began an earnest make out session, their legs soon entwined together as if they were one.

"It's OK, love, I can tell," he said huskily. He could tell that she was still a virgin as clearly as he could tell the day she had come to him after Richard Malfoy had assaulted her. "We don't have to if you don't want to." Though he had to admit, he was a little surprised by the fact, since she was now twenty-two and had been considered an adult capable of making adult choices for five years.

"I want to," she said. "I just wanted you to know. I – it never felt right with anyone else," she said.

"I know," he agreed, thinking about how using prostitutes had been an adequate outlet for his lust before he had met her, but after, just the thought had been extremely distasteful and being alone was infinitely preferable. His heart felt to remember his previously outlet and he realised it was something that he had to share with her. He propped himself up on his elbow, distancing himself slightly from her so he would be so damn distracted by her half-naked body. Not that he was doing a very good job of not being distracted. "Dora, there's something I need to tell you."

"You're married?" she teased.

"No."

"Girlfriend?"

"Dora, there's hardly anyone else in the world who wants to be with me, even if I wanted them," he said, making it clear that there was no-one else he wanted other than her. "There hasn't been anyone since you – I haven't as much as held hands with a woman. But before you – before you I mainly used prostitutes. I know it sounds really revolting," he added quickly, "but I honestly never thought I'd meet someone that I was crazy about and who was crazy about me so it was easier to reduce it to a financial transaction then try and find someone who _wasn't_ disgusted by me."

"Wait – you're crazy about me?" she asked, her eyes lighting up with delight at the thought – and flashing that green that he was beginning to think was a subconscious reflection of her feelings towards him.

"Yeah, but that's not the point. I want to be honest with you and I don't want you to be disgusted by me."

"Remus, why do I care what you did before you were involved with me?" Tonks asked, genuinely puzzled. "Besides," she added flippantly, "I bet you treated them much better than any of their other clients. Dad says Uncle Lucius used to brag –"

"Please don't finish that sentence," Lupin begged. If Lucius Malfoy's attitude towards half-bloods and muggle-borns was anything to go by, then his attitude towards prostitutes couldn't be any more savoury. Always the top of the class when it came to Hypocrisy 101, he no doubt figured that they were there to provide him pleasure and that there was no need to treat them with anything resembling human decency. "It doesn't change how you feel about me?"

"I don't think anything could change how I feel about you," she said.

He smiled at her. "That's exactly what I wanted to hear," he said. He leaned in to kiss her again. Their initial burst of desire had faded a little, and they took things a little slower this time. He slid his hands down the length of her front, kissing the swell of her breasts as they escaped from her bra, then kissed his way down her torso and abdomen. She grabbed his hair and bucked against him as his hands and mouth travelled down her body and she could feel his stubble scrape against her bare skin.

"Remus!" she cried out. "Oh, God, I've missed you so much!"

He tugged at the buttons of her skintight jeans. "I much preferred you in skirts," he complained.

"I'll remember that for next time," she said. "Ooooh," she cried out when he finally got off her jeans and pulled down her panties at the same time. "Remus!"

"I thought you said you wanted this?" he asked.

"I do," she promised him. "It's just – you never did that before."

He chuckled, remembering how he'd finger her without taking her underwear off, paranoid that it would be the thing that pushed him past the limits of his restraints. "I can't get in trouble for having you naked in my bed this time," he pointed out. _Although I never had you in my bed in the first place_, he remembered. These basic freedoms – not to mention the fact that everyone knew they were in his bedroom and he didn't give a damn about it – made their secret, stolen trysts on his couch seem tawdry. _I'm so sorry, love_, he thought.

But that was then and this was now. Tossing her panties on the floor along with her jeans, he lowered his head between her legs and began using his fingers and tongue on her. "Remus!" she gasped, clutching at his hair again, sliding her legs down his back. He'd touched her down there before, brought her to orgasm before, but it wasn't the same as this. She didn't know if it was because he'd never used his tongue on her or if it was the relative openness that they could live under now... "Remus!" she cried again. She writhed under his touch, an explosive orgasm building up inside her until she was screaming incoherently as he brought her to an earth-shattering climax.

"You ready?" he asked her. She nodded. "Help me," he directed her. "I feel remarkable overdressed." Obligingly, she helped him out of his shirt and pants, his erection obvious. She shivered in anticipation, even her extremely limited experience telling her that it would be a hell of a lot different than a mere handjob. "Hey, don't be worried," he said. "I'll hurt a little but I'll be as gentle as I can. And I can put a numbing charm on you if you want."

She shook her head. "I want to feel all of it," she said huskily. "I don't care if it hurts. It can't be any worse than – well, never mind," she said, thinking about Snape and the pleasure he had taken out of extracting information about her relationship with Lupin. "I want this, Remus. I've wanted it for a long time."

He nodded. He pulled his y-fronts down and kneeled between her spread legs. He reached down behind her to unhook her bra so she was completely naked, the same as him. He lowered himself on top of her and kissed her deeply as he pushed himself inside her. He felt her tense up as he buried his erection inside her, trying to go slowly but the animal lust in him wanting to pound his manhood in her. He brought his hand down between her legs and began stroking her, building her up to another orgasm to distract her from the pain. "Remus!" she started crying out his name again, the pleasure of the orgasm all but obliterating the pain – it was barely discomfort now – as Lupin broke her in as gently as he could manage.

He could feel her opening up at his ministrations and began thrusting with more power and speed. _What do you want me to do?_ She asked him, tuning in to his limited Legilimency ability.

_Whatever feels natural, love_. She tangled her legs up in his and the feeling of having his legs partially restrained was an unusually but exquisite one, forcing him to work harder and delay his own orgasm.

Groaning, he thrust hard enough inside her to make her yelp, more at surprise at the force than actual discomfort, and spilled himself inside her. Then he buried his head in her shoulder and started to cry. "I'll be alright," he choked out in gasped. "Please just hold me as tight as you can." She obliged and after a few minutes he calmed in her comforting embrace. "I've missed you so much," he whispered. "As soon as I heard you were coming, I tried to leave because I knew if I saw you again..." he nuzzled her neck, inhaling her scent, all the sweeter for the fact he could smell himself and the exertions of sex on her.

"I tried to find you," she said in a plaintive voice.

"I tried to stay off the radar," he said off-handedly. "It's not that hard for a werewolf to do. No-one cares much."

"_I_ cared," she said reproachfully.

"You were seventeen-year-old student..._My_ student... You shouldn't have cared as much as you did. _I_ should have seen to it that you didn't care as much as u did. I felt guilty for a long time. I kept thinking that maybe if I had kept my distance, you would have fallen for someone more appropriate."

"And how do you feel now?"

"Still a little guilty," he admitted. "I feel like if I really loved you then I would stay away from you. But I can't. And you're old enough now to make up your own choices and if that choice includes being in bed with a werewolf who's over a decade older than you."

"Really?" she asked, her eyes sparkling with hope.

"Yes, really, but there's something I need to make clear, Dora, I never intended on getting married and I never intended on being a dad."

"Why on earth not?"

"Because I never wanted to be a dad and I don't see any reason for getting married if I've got no intention on having kids."

"Never wanted to have kids – or felt that you ought not to have them?" Tonks asked.

"Fine, the latter, but it amounts to the same thing. I don't even know if I _can_ have children – I've never heard of a werewolf having a child, at least not after the fact." Though come to think of it, he hadn't heard of it _before_ the fact, but at least it was plausible that a person could be bitten well into adulthood, having already had a child. And I don't want to put a child through the stigma of having me as a father."

"Why?"

"Christ, you can be naive sometimes, love," he said. "Don't get me wrong, I love that about you, but... I'm not your dad. I'm not just a little beneath you. I'm not just someone who's unavailable a few nights a week. You're adult enough to know what you're getting yourself into, but I won't put a child through that. Maybe I should have made that clear to you back in school." _Probably could have discouraged you_, he thought.

"It wouldn't have discouraged me," she said, making him wonder if he was thinking a little too loudly. "I understand."

_Maybe a few months of being with me with make her learn_, he thought. It would certainly be easier on him if she were the one to walk away. What was it about her that he found it so hard to give her up? "What happened between you and Snape?" he asked her. "Just something you said before," he explained when she looked confused. "That I couldn't hurt you any worse than – I figured you were talking about Snape." She squirmed and he knew he'd gotten it right. He'd never had it confirmed that Snape had used Occlumency on her, but his gut had told him that it was the only reason Snape had insisted on interrogating her himself. "He used Occlumency on you, didn't he?" he asked. "That _son-of-a-bitch!_" he hissed. He could have subjected Lupin himself to the same violation and gotten the same results, but no, he'd had to go after Tonks precisely because she was more innocent than he was and it would have affected it her... and thus affected _him_ to think of her going through it.

"I think I held my own, though. I made him stop by impersonating Lily. You should have seen the look on his face. If I didn't know better, I would have thought he'd had genuine feelings for her."

Lupin chuckled at that. "Good for you, love," he said approvingly, and she squirmed with delight at the compliment even more than she had when he'd complimented her as a student. "But I want you to tell me if he so much as looks at you funny again. The man knows enough about Dark Creatures to know better than to mess with a werewolf's girl."

"I'm your girl?" she asked pleasedly.

"I wouldn't have brought you here if I didn't want you to be my girl," he said. "I would have thought that was obvious. I don't just haul women into my room for no reason."

She giggled. "And here was me thinking you were a total player."

"Oh, come here, you," he said, pulling her into his arms possessively.

* * *

"I won't give her up so don't ask me to. You should have better predicted what Sirius was going to do," Lupin said defiantly to Dumbledore that evening. Tonks was sleeping peacefully in his room. He had already gotten crap from Molly for so publicly taking her to bed – as if she would have had the same go at her son if it had been Charlie - and was willing to take on anyone who disapproved with defiance. "She's an adult; she can make her own choices."

"I highly agree," Dumbledore said calmly. "The only issues I ever had with your involvement with her were her age and the fact she was your student. I never thought you had a malign influence on her. And I think she's intelligent enough to know what she's getting into. My question is: do both of you know what you're getting into?"

Lupin nodded. "She knows she'll never be married or have kids with me – honestly, I hope that discourages her in the end. She's the same age as her mum was when she had her – that's got to be something that will haunt her after a while. And it's easier than me giving her up. I've never felt loved the way she loves me. It's like she honestly doesn't see my lycanthropy. Even my mum didn't love me the way she should have."

"Your mother –" Dumbledore started.

"Tried very hard, I know. But I was old enough to know that something changed. I don't blame her for that but I wasn't oblivious to it, either. With Dora..." he shrugged, helpless to describe the way he felt about her – and the way she made him feel. "If she wants to leave me, I won't try and make her stay. But if she wants to be with me, I won't push her away, either."

"That's all anyone can ask," Dumbledore said gravely.

Lupin found Molly in the kitchen, no doubt waiting for a confrontation. "If you're going to call me names, you can save yourself the effort," he said. "I didn't ask for her to come back. And it wasn't my fault that she didn't love Charlie back," he said. "I shouldn't have encouraged her to go out with him when I knew she didn't have feelings for, but that's all I'm sorry for, at least as far as Charlie's concerned."

Molly eyed him suspiciously. She was inclined to believe him – at least as far as Charlie was concerned. But Charlie didn't bother her so much. He had been seventeen and it wasn't the first or last time in his life that he had been disappointed. Besides, he was happy now in Romania, possibly happier in his work with dragons than he ever would be with a woman. No, Charlie wasn't her main concern. "Did you ever entertain thoughts about Ginny?" she blurted out.

For a second the thought was so ludicrous that Lupin didn't understand what she was talking about. Then "Ginny?" he asked. "Your daughter Ginny? The twelve-year-old?"

"She's fourteen," Molly said primly.

Twelve, fourteen – she was still well and truly underage and young enough to be his daughter, to boot – he was the same age James Potter and she was a year younger than Harry. The one thing he had been able to console himself with over Tonks was that she _wasn't_ young enough to be his daughter... despite Andromeda and Ted only being six years older than _him_.

The idea was so ludicrous that he snorted with laughter. Molly looked at him furiously. "I'm sorry, Molly, was _that_ what you were worried about? Merlin's beard, if I'd known _that_, I would have told you so upfront. Ginny – she's underage and younger than _Harry_, for heaven's sake. You remember Harry? My best friend's _son_?" He made a face. "Eww I think I'm going to go hang out with Sirius. Maybe I can scrub that image from my brain if I'm with someone my own age"

"You really didn't...?" Molly asked, still a little suspicious.

Lupin supposed he should give Molly credit for being a concerned mother. Getting involve with a student when he had been old enough to be some of his _other_ student's father - he had taught the twins the first time around, and he had been old enough to be _their_ dad – tended to evoke suspicion in people's minds, so he tried not to feel resentful over it. "Molly, I assure you, you've given it far more thought then I ever did. For the love of Merlin, _please_ don't bring it up ever. Again. Ech." He made a face and started walking away from her, thinking he needed a strong firewhisky and a good adult chat with Sirius after that mental image. Then he thought about it, stopped and turned around. "And no offence to your daughter, Molly, I'm sure she'll be a very special woman to someone one day, but Dora was the only woman I ever had feelings for."

* * *

"Ech. She really said that? That's gross," Tonks said when Lupin relayed it to her. She tried the mental image of her with Ron or Harry, and it grossed her out, even though the age gap between her and the two fifth-year boys was less than the gap between her and Lupin.

"I can kind of see her logic," Lupin admitted. "People tend to get protective when it comes to their kids – I mean, look at Lily and James. When parents found out I'd been involved with a student, a lot of them thought the worst; that I was this perverted predator with a hankering for students – and that any student would do. Matter of fact, I can't think of a way to reassure them all that you were always the only woman for me – perversely, I think Molly was a little _insulted_ that I was squicked out by the idea of – well, you know. They don't want me interested in their children but they don't want someone to think of their children as repulsive, either."

She curled up to him. "I'm really the only woman for you?" she asked.

"I'm not exactly the best person to be asking that – I didn't exactly have a lot to choose from," he reminded her gently. "But I've had crushes, of course, and for what it's worth – I never felt such a strong attraction to anyone else."

"That sounds good enough for me," she said. She wasn't insecure enough to be bothered by the fact he'd had crushes on women before – or even that he had slept with women before her. That was largely because of the disparity in their ages... and the fact he didn't feel about any of them the way he did about her all but negated that, as far as she was concerned.

They lay in companionable silence before Lupin addressed the issue that had been playing on his mind. "Love, we need to tell your parents."

Predictably, she stiffened in his arms. "Why?" she asked plaintively.

"Would you rather they heard from someone else?" he asked. "And they will here from someone else, love. It will be far better if they hear from us. And your mum possibly won't kill me if you're there in the room with me. If you won't tell them with me, Dora, then I'll do it alone, and I think it will go down a lot better if you're with me." If nothing else than because killing your daughter's boyfriend in front of her tended not to bode well for familial relationships, which Andromeda knew well enough.

"Fine," she said a trifle sullenly, one of the rare occasions that Lupin was reminded of how recently she had graduated her teenage years.

* * *

"You perverted son-of-a-bitch!" Andromeda screamed at him – although she was yet to raise her wand, Lupin nodded. "You – said –"

"As I recall, what I said was to keep her away from me because I wouldn't vouch for my restraint next time," Lupin said calmly. "You have an issue with the fact Sirius invited her into the Order – what would have been over my wishes, had I known about it, no less – then take it up with him."

Andromeda glowered at Lupin. Thing was, he had a point. She had known Sirius for all his life, up to when he had been imprisoned, and he was every inch the Black she was - strong-willed when it came to what he believed in. Problem was, he believed in his friend's integrity, above that of pretty much everyone else's except maybe Dumbledore's. Certainly more than her own or he would have at least consulted her before he'd invited her daughter to join the order knowing full well that her and Lupin together in that house was sure to result in a reconciliation. "He had no right to do that," she said.

"You think I haven't already said that to him?" Lupin asked. "It's done. She wants to be with me. Everyone in the house will attest to that. Hell, Snape can fuck with her mind again if it makes you happy."

_I didn't agree to that_, she told him silently.

_He'll never do it... Lily,_ he told her. _But your mother doesn't know that_.

Andromeda glowered again, but this time it was towards the Hogwart's Potions Master. He had disliked Tonks simply for being a non-Slytherin, and then for being involved with his nemesis from schooldays. Hell, she suspected he disliked Tonks for being her daughter – he had some really funny ideas about half-bloods and blood-traitors, especially in light of the fact his own mother's fullblood status had been dubious – much more than Andromeda's – and she had married a muggle. _Least I married a muggle-born wizard, _shethought, remembering. It had been a lousy thing to do to her – beyond lousy – and she suspected Tonks could very well have done something _else_ to inspire Snape to use such a vicious means of getting the truth out of her. As much as she would love to blame Lupin for it, she knew she couldn't. But Lupin actually seemed sincere in the fact that Tonks was with him of her own free will, and wouldn't _stop_ being with him, and Snape could use Legilimency on her if Andromeda wanted to prove it.

She turned her glare to her daughter. It occurred to her that if she'd just let the two of them have the good-bye they'd both wanted five years ago, she might not have been so desperate to see him that she'd co-opted Sirius – or Sirius had encouraged her – however the two of them had planned it. And she had known Lupin in his schooldays – at least for a year – better than most of his own first-years had. He had an innate gentleness, and awareness of his limitations and a fervent desire not to hurt anyone because of his base nature, that she hadn't seen in many of her own House-mates. The last time he had turned, that fateful night two years ago, while it could have had tragic consequences, had been an aberration spurned on by his desire to expose Wormtail and vindicated Sirius. So long as he stayed away from Tonks at the full moon, even under the calming influence of Wolfsbane – which Andromeda knew he would – he could cause her no more harm than she could, at least not of the physical nature.

Lupin sensed Andromeda's thoughts without having to exert his (somewhat limited) Legilimency skills. "Andromeda, please," he said. "You knew me better than most of my own first-years. You know how hard I've tried not to hurt anyone. We have a sealed room at Grimmauld Place that's stronger than the one I had growing up with. You know I'm incapable of hurting her."

"Not physically," Andromeda amended. Lupin looked away, well aware that she was in for a world of hurt via the vicious gossip that would start swirling about her once it got out that she was seeing her werewolf ex-Professor again. She gave her daughter a piercing look. "You'd better not come crying to me when people start calling you the werewolf's whore," she spat.

Lupin _felt_, rather than _saw_, Tonks flinched, and for a second, he thought – hoped, even – that her mother's harsh words might be what knocked some sense into her. But she gathered her strength quickly enough. "I've thought of that," she said defiantly. "And I can deal." _I'd deal with anything for him_ was her unspoken declaration.

"It's your funeral," Andromeda said, but it seemed to be the last bit of criticism she would say on the subject. Her daughter was an adult, and usually a highly competent one, and if she wanted to throw her personal credibility away on an ill-advised love-affair, then that was her problem.


	8. Chapter 8

_Hey, guys! Sorry for the delay! I'm publishing as I write so I haven't been able to establish as big a backlog as with Begining or War. _

**Chapter Eight**

"Bill, you're as bad as Tonks. Take that jumper off," Molly complained. Her oldest son was rugged up in several heavy jumpers, the biting cold he felt as a result of shifting from Egypt to London. He was glad to be in close proximity to his family again – except when his mother started resembling a mother hen – and besides, Fleur was far more miserable in the heat than he was in the cold – but _damn_, the cold was biting after the desert warmth of the Middle-East.

"Merlin, I would _love_ to have his physiology right now," Bill complained. Molly raised an eyebrow at him. "Sorry," he mumbled. His mother was somewhat sensitive to jokes about lycanthropy. Lupin's body temperature naturally ran higher than a full-human's, and since it was much easier for Tonks to rug up in jumpers and blankets than him to cool down when she put the fire on, she tended to be quite rugged up. "They look good together," he said tentatively, sneaking a glimpse of them in the next room. She was curled up on the couch, wrapped in a blanket, her head in his lap. He stroked her hair with one hand and kept a book propped up with the other. They looked oddly right together – him so nebbish, her, so much younger and unorthodox-looking, and yet – you could see the connection as if it were written in meter-high words. "I never saw her with Charlie," he admitted.

"He was devoted to her," Molly interjected. As any proud mother, she could never quite get over the fact that a woman would prefer _any_ other man over one of her sons – let alone a man who was considerably older with such a debilitating condition, physically, emotionally and socially.

Bill shrugged. "That may have been so, but she never returned his feelings. I saw how hard he tried."

"He's a good boy," Molly said indignantly.

"You really have to know what kind of harassment she went through, mum," Bill said. "I rescued her couple of times after I became prefect. She got it from almost everyone - not just the likes of Richard Malfoy. Sometimes I think the only men who loved her for herself were Charlie and Remus. And I think that made her very wary of men. And then along comes this man who wouldn't dream of thinking about being with her, and there has to be a certain appeal in a friendship. And it would have gone from there. And then you have her, who is truly baffled why someone wouldn't see him as anything _but_ this intelligent man who's far more human than most of us, at least twenty-five days out of twenty-eight. There would have been a certain appeal in _that_ friendship. I can totally see how it happened. I know Charlie's a great guy, but it's kind of hard to compete with two people who had something that the other really needed."

"She used Charlie. He got his hopes up," Molly protested.

"I wouldn't deny that," Bill admitted. He wondered how much his younger brother shared their mother's opinions – that Lupin should have been more responsible at the time – and how much he had matured past caring what had happened five years ago. "But you can't deny, mum that they're happy together – and she would have eventually made him much unhappier than she did."

* * *

Tonks was distracting him. He'd allowed her to stay in the same room while he worked so long as she kept still and quiet – neither of which Tonks was good at. The nature of her work was to be constantly tracking people, so to quietly read a book for hours couldn't retain her interest and she constantly asked him questions, interrupting his work, sending him meaningful looks.

Finally, he put down his quill. "Fine," he growled. "If I'm not going to get any work done, I may as well enjoy the distraction." He patted his thigh and giggling, she scooted over onto his lip. "You're a terrible influence on me, you know," he said huskily, running his lips over her neck and wrapping his arms tightly around her waist. She leaned back into him, whimpering happily at his touch. He nipped at her skin gently and kissed his way up to her ear while she squirmed in his lap. He could feel himself growing hard without her doing a thing other than wriggling around. He moved one hand up her loose-fitting crop-top. "Good girl," he said approvingly when he felt that she wasn't wearing a bra. His fingers curled around her bare breast and he began rubbing his thumb against her nipple, feeling it grow hard under his touch.

"Remus!" she cried, half in desire and half in admonishment. "Not here!"

"I'll have you wherever I like," he said throatily, and she shivered at the lust in his voice. She arched her neck to kiss him, and squealed when he abruptly twisted her around so she was straddling him. He had the strength and grace to do this seamlessly – both of which she lacked – and she had quickly learned when he did abrupt things like that, the best thing was to wrap her arms around his neck and go along for the ride; trying to figure out what he was trying to do usually ended her up on her ass. So that was what she did – wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him passionate while he moved his hands under her shirt up her bare back...

He stiffened when he smelt and sensed the presence of someone else in the room – another man. "Charlie!" he yelped, mortified to see that, of all people, _Charlie Weasley_ had walked in on them. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"Mum asked me to get you," Charlie said. "I didn't expect you to be here," he said to Tonks.

"Remus said I could stay if I kept still and quiet."

"You? Still and quiet?" Charlie asked derisively, the contempt creeping into his voice. He had gotten over Tonks years ago – you didn't pine for five years over someone you had only dated for a few weeks, even if you _had _been pining for them for years before that. But seeing them together brought back all the hurt and humiliation he had felt, first for the way she had dumped him without explanation and then to find out three years later that it was because she had started seeing their Professor, the same Professor that he had just walked in on her making out with.

Tonks squirmed, this time uncomfortably. She hadn't spoken to Charlie since the end of the final year, and to hear the contempt in his voice now hurt her more than she cared to admit. "Tell your mother I'll be there in a sec," he said, easing Tonks off his lap in as graceful a way as he could manage, given they'd been caught out making out by the ex-boyfriend that she'd left for him.

He caught Charlie in the hallway. There was so much unspoken between them, and he could feel the simmering resentment coming off Charlie as if it were a tangible heat. "I'm sorry about what happened," he said.

"Really? Then why'd you do it?" Charlie asked snidely. "Because you were a coward, that's why. You only wanted me to be with her to keep her safe, didn't you?"

"Yeah," Lupin admitted.

"You knew how much I liked her and you figured I'd make a convenient bodyguard because you were too cowardly to face the consequences of protecting her yourself?" Lupin nodded slightly, knowing exactly where Charlie was going with this. "Then you're a coward. You used me to do what you weren't willing to."

"And you're _still_ hung up over it?" Lupin asked.

"No, I'm not. I'm happy doing what I am and she would have only made me unhappy the longer it went on. But that's not the point. We were both seventeen, we have an excuse for our lousy judgement. You were what, forty?"

"Thirty," Lupin corrected. He wasn't even forty now, and he knew damn well that Charlie had only said it to get a rise out of him.

"Whatever. The point is, we were both young enough that we were allowed bad judgement when it came to stuff like that. You – what were you thinking? You were lousy at protecting her, getting someone else to do it for you. You didn't care about her nearly as much as you said you did."

Lupin was silent at that. While he knew Charlie was bitter at his ill-treatment, there was some truth to his words. He _had _used Charlie when he'd needed someone to keep an eye out on Tonks... and hadn't been prepared to take the consequences of doing it himself. And he hadn't cared about her as much as he'd said he did, or else he wouldn't have gotten involved with her at such a young age.

He let Charlie stalk off.

* * *

Tonks was leaning against Lupin, her head on his shoulder, and he was absently playing with her hair in a motion that was both intimate and enchanting to watch. It was clear from the way he looked at her, touched her that he was deeply in love with her – and that she returned his feelings. Charlie watched them with mixed feelings. It was clear that Lupin made her happy in a way that he could never have achieved. It wasn't that he still had feelings for her, wasn't that he begrudged her happiness, but everytime he looked at them he was reminded of the fact that Lupin had used him to protect someone they both cared about and that she had gone along with it.

There was the sound of the front door opening, and heavy footsteps in the hall before Snape appeared at the door of the dining room. Tonks immediately tensed up to see the man who had violated her mind, more to get back at her boyfriend for a schoolboy slight than for any legitimate reason. She panicked and immediately returned to her automatic defence – that of looking like Lily Evans.

Snape scowled to see her do it; he had never quite forgiven her for pulling such a stunt. Lupin grabbed her and twisted her around so he could envelope her in a hug. "It's OK, love," he whispered in her ear. "It's OK. Come back. Change back." Out of the corner of his eye, he watched her auburn hair change back to her natural mousy brown; it wasn't quite the bright pink that he associated with her, but it was better than nothing. "OK, I'm going to Appirate you into your room," he informed her. Nodding against his hold, she wrapped her arms around his neck and he Appirated them into her room.

"It's OK," he said again, leading her to her bed. "He can't hurt you again. I'll make sure he doesn't. I'll rip his fucking head off if he so much as thinks about it," he growled in a way that made Tonks feel a little more relaxed.

He stayed with Tonks for a little bit until there was a knock on the door. "It's just me, Molly," the older woman called. "Can I come in?"

"If you want," Tonks replied shakily for them both.

Molly opened the door. "I had no idea," she said quietly. "I mean, I heard, but I thought even Severus wouldn't stoop that low."

"He had no reason to use Legilimency on her," Lupin growled. "He only did it because he hates me."

"You, Andromeda, anyone whose blood's purer than his," Molly said. "I bought you a sedative," she said to Tonks. The younger woman took it gratefully; despising herself for her weakness, her hands were still shaking. "What's with the Lily thing?" Molly asked, her curiosity, at always, running high.

"He used to have the biggest crush on her," Lupin said, delighting in spilling some of Snape's secrets. "You wouldn't have been aware of it, it was after your time –" Molly gave him a pointed look at that. "I only meant that we – James, Lily, Sirius and Severus and I – were all in the same year so it was kind of hard to miss the way he'd follow around after her. I was pretty proud of her when I heard she reverted to Lily to make him stop, heard it really rattled him."

Molly made a face. "Severus and _Lily_?" she asked incredulously. "That... yuk. I think I prefer the idea of –"

"Don't you _dare_ say it, I've only just managed to forget about it a little," Lupin said, knowing that Molly was going to finish that sentence with '_the idea of you and Ginny_'. He felt Tonks relax in his arms and knew the sedative was taking effect. "I'll come down," he said after he knew Tonks had fallen asleep. Following Molly out, he put a containing spell on the room just in case Snape got any funny ideas about screwing with her head anymore – the spell could be broken, especially by a powerful enough wizard as Snape, but not without making a lot of ruckus doing it.

He saw Snape in the kitchen, drinking a cup of tea like he was welcome here. "You," he growled. "Don't you ever – fucking – come here again – without warning us. I'll get her out of the house next time."

Snape looked coolly at Lupin. "Really?" he asked snidely. "And on whose orders do you have the right to dictate what I do?"

"On mine," Sirius spoke up. "It being my house and all. What he said. Don't come here again without warning them. It was a lousy thing to do. She's a good kid."

"Who was old enough to know that what she was doing was wrong," Snape pointed out snidely.

"I love the fact you chop and change your story whenever it suits you – who exactly was at fault? Remus or Tonks?" Sirius asked. "Merlin, you're just as nasty as you always were."

Snape glowered at that, and then flounced off the second his business at Grimmauld Place was finished. "Good riddance to bad rubbish," Sirius declared.

"I don't get it," Harry said. "Why is Tonks so scared of him? And why did she transform to mum when she saw him?"

"Your mother and Severus were fairly close early on," Lupin said, deciding that it was best not to reveal the information that Snape had actually been deeply infatuated with her. "She was, like, the only girl outside of Slytherin who could stand being around him. He used Legilimency on her – Dora, I mean – when he caught us together and she retaliated by transforming into Lily. I think it rattled him somewhat – at any rate, it made him stop."

"What's –"

"Legilimency is, for lack of a better way of putting it, mind reading. It's really invasive and there was no need for it. He could have used it on _me_ if he wanted to find out if we'd slept together – or there are loads of charms that would have proven she was still a virgin. He did it to get to me, plain and simple. He knew I would rather have been subjected to it myself than have her subjected to it, and it would have gotten him the same results. I know he's done a lot for me with the Wolfsbane, but I can't forgive him for what he did to Dora."

Harry went bug-eyed to hear that. He had always known that Snape was a complex man with some rather convoluted ideas, but to torture Tonks like that – and it didn't help that he was quite fond of the older woman, who was a lot of fun to be around... and Lupin had by far been his favourite Professor, so as his girlfriend, his fondness extended somewhat to Tonks. "That – jerk!" Harry said indignantly.

"I can think of some other words," Lupin said bitterly. "He won't hurt her again, not if I can help it," he said grimly.

"How is she?"

"Sleeping," Lupin told Charlie. "She'll be OK. It just rattles her, being around him."

"Can't say I blame her. I mean – I don't like Snape much – never did – but I can't believe he'd stoop to something like that."

Lupin shrugged. "I have a history with Severus that goes a lot deeper than most people. We've never liked each other. Some of it's got to do with Lily, some of it's got to do with his ideas about purebloods – you know technically my blood is purer then his? All of ours was," he said, referring to his three best friends back at Hogwarts. "Some of it I don't know about and never cared to find out. But God, sometimes he can be the most mean-spirited bastard around. And I handed Dora right over to him. I should have just waited a few months. He wouldn't have been able to touch her after that."

"Why –"

"Why did you chase after her for so long?" Lupin asked. "She's just that kind of woman. She's... enchanting. Captivating, except you never had trouble attracting girls. She was the first woman I was with who honestly didn't care about what I am – didn't even get why there _was_ something to care about. One day she looked at me differently and it was like flicking on a light switch. And I repaid her feelings for me but exposing her to Snape's mean-spiritedness. I should have waited."

"Would you have waited if you'd known what would happen?"

"Of course I would have!"

"Then you can't keep beating yourself up for it. OK, so you didn't demonstrate the best of judgements, but you didn't realise who he would do to her. You thought you would be the only one to face the consequences, and you had good reason to. You can't hold yourself responsible for Snape being a – what did you call him – _mean-spirited bastard_," Charlie said.

"Since when are you being so nice?" Lupin asked suspiciously – almost as suspiciously as he would have been had it been _Snape_ who was being nice.

"Since Snape came out looking like far more the bad guy in this than you did. And since it's obvious you know how to calm her down. I don't know – I just don't think it's worth holding these grudges, especially over someone I don't even care about – like that – anymore."

Lupin smiled. "Thank you," he said. "That means a lot to me."


	9. Chapter 9

_Thanks for reading, everyone! It's not happy sailing for our couple - I'm sure by now my readers have worked out that I'm big on the angst, and what character has more to angst about in the _HP _universe than Lupin?Emjoy reading!_

"Easy, love. You've taken a nasty fall. I don't want you to make it worse."

Tonks came to in St. Mungos to the waiting company of Lupin. She groaned. "I feel awful."

"I don't blame you. You tumbled down a dozen stone steps. Not to mention half a dozen curses that Bellatrix threw at you. That woman _really_ has it in for you."

Tonks smiled weakly. "That sounds like Bellatrix. She puts such a stock in pureblood. What happened?"

"Harry walked into a trap. Kreacher lied to aid and abet Voldermort – well, Narcissa, which is the same thing as far as the Malfoys are concerned. It was all a big mess." He felt his voice choking when he thought about Sirius; an irrational part of him had wanted to, and still wanted to slap Harry for being such an idiot. Surely he had realised what idiocy it was to go charging after Sirius?

And now Sirius was dead, having charged in to rescue _Harry_. Lupin could have sworn he could feel his heart breaking. Sirius had been his oldest friend, and living with him this last year, the two men had grown very close – perhaps closer than they had been in school, because back then, Sirius and _James_ had always been the closest of friends.

"Remus? What aren't you telling me?" Tonks asked. "Has something happened to you?"

He shook his head; apart from Dumbledore and, ironically, Harry himself, he had been the only one to escape uninjured. "No, it's Sirius. He's dead."

"Dead? How?" No wonder he was so upset, Tonks thought; she knew how close he and Sirius had been. If she had been the first woman who didn't care about his lycanthropy, then Sirius and James had been the first _people_ – other than Dumbledore and his mother – who hadn't cared about it.

"Bellatrix," Lupin said flatly; it was all he needed to say. Bellatrix had a particular axe to grind with those she considered traitors to the Black name; namely, her sister Andromeda, and her cousin Sirius. "He was my oldest friend and one of the first people who didn't give a shit about my lycanthropy and now he's gone." Strange how it felt worse now then it had when Sirius had been convicted and sent to Azkaban; perhaps then because he had hatred to mask his grief.

"Hey... you have me," Tonks said. She reached for his hand, and while Lupin didn't pull away, he didn't exactly clutch at her hand, either. She looked at him in concern. He was only thirty-six, but he looked older than that. It wasn't even that his lycanthropy was stressful; grief seemed to have completely overshadowed him. Dimly, she realised that he and Sirius had been friends for longer then she had been alive, and she tried not to feel jealous over the fact.

The Battle at the Ministry had taken the wind out of a lot of them, but especially Lupin and Harry. Lupin knew that he was taking his anger out of Harry, but he couldn't help himself. If Harry had just _listened_ to older, wiser heads, rather than going off half-cocked and setting in motion a chain of events that had resulted in Sirius's death...

"It's not fair to take it out on him," Tonks told him. "Bellatrix killed Sirius, not Harry. She almost killed _me_," she admonished him gently in an attempt to remind him that he also could have lost her in that battle.

"I know that," Lupin grunted peevishly. She knew she was trying her best, but she was driving him batty with her sympathy and her insistence that Harry wasn't to blame. He was _so angry_ at so many people, including himself for not realising what Kreacher was up to, and Harry was a convenient outlet for that anger.

"You're the closest thing he has to family now," Tonks reminded him gently.

"And if he hadn't charged off half-cocked convinced that he was playing the hero, he would still have Sirius," Lupin said scathingly. Tonks flinched at the harshness of his words. "I'm sorry, love. I'm _so angry_ – and I miss him _so much_. You have no idea how lonely I was before I became friends with him and James."

"You always told me how lonely you were before me," she reminded him.

"That's different."

"How?"

"It just is. Friendships – they're something different. I was eight when I was bitten. By the time I was eleven, I was resigned to being lonely. And then along came James and Sirius who not only didn't care – they thought it was kind of cool. For the first time since I was bitten, I didn't feel like a monster. He was like a brother to me. He was more family to me then my dad was." Bitterly he remembered how his dad had been unable to accept his lycanthropy – at least his mother had _tried_.

"Well, he _was_ actually my family," Tonks muttered under her breath, but let it go for the time being. It was clear that Lupin was determined to wallow in self-pity.

* * *

"Do you think you could say something to him?" Harry asked hopefully.

Tonks shook her head. "He'll snap out of it eventually. I know Sirius was the closest thing to family that you had – but he was the same for Remus. Maybe more, because Sirius was one of the few people who ever accepted him for what he is."

"_I_ accept him for what he is!"

"You don't count, you're –"

"Just a kid, I know," Harry said, scowling.

"I was going to say in a subordinate position to him. I should have clarified. Sirius was one of the few people who were his _equal_ who accepted him for what he is."

"Then... why doesn't he talk to you?" Harry asked pointedly. "Shouldn't _you_ be his equal?"

Tonks let that one slide. The truth was, she felt she _should_ be his equal. Sure, she was significantly younger than him, but unlike Harry, she was very much an adult, as well as the woman who was supposed to be sharing her life – more so that anyone else. Instead, he was shutting her out and acting like he had no-one now that Sirius was gone.

His reaction to Sirius's death – his deep plunge into self-pity and the way he pushed her away – had made her realise that she didn't have the standing with him that she thought she did. She had thought from the way he had taken on her parents and told her he wouldn't give her up again that he was committed to her. And maybe he was – as much as anyone who had resigned himself to a life of loneliness _could_ be committed to someone. But his idea of being committed to someone and _her_ idea of being committed to someone was clearly light years apart.

She wanted something more than what they had, she had to admit. She wanted more than having separate bedrooms in a house they shared with the Weasleys and whatever other members of the Order came and went. She wanted a proper commitment, the kind that Molly and Arthur had – or at least the kind of Bill and Fleur had.

He had once told her that he had no intention of marrying or having children. She didn't see that it was fair he got to make that decision unilaterally.

She marched into his room a week later, finally fed up with his self-pitying behaviour. "Stop shutting me out," she ordered him.

"I'm not shutting you out, love," he said tiredly.

"Yes, you are. You think you've got the market cornered on grief? He was the closest thing to family that Harry had. He was practically the only family that _I_ have. _I'm_ supposed to be the closest person to you, Remus. _I'm_ supposed to be the one you open up to in times like this. Or do you only want me when you're horny?"

"Of course not," he said.

"Then bloody well _talk_ to me."

"What do you want from me, Dora?" Lupin asked tiredly.

"I want you to be a proper bloody boyfriend. I want you to treat me like I'm your goddamn partner and not a convenient lay."

"Well, I'm not, am I?" Lupin asked her, a hysterical note to his voice. "I've seen the way you look at Bill and Fleur. I told you when we first got together that it wasn't something I could give you."

"Something you _won't_ give me, Remus. You can still marry. I checked."

He glared at her, resentful that she had gone behind his back and found that detail out. "It doesn't matter," he said. "I'm not going to marry you."

"Why not?"

"Because I'm sterile. And I won't do that to you. You think this is how it would be in the real world? Outside these walls? You will be _crucified_, Dora, if you marry a werewolf. Or didn't you work that out from the flak you got just for seeing me?"

"I don't care about that! Everyone says mum married beneath her –"

"Well, I do! And I've told you before, Dora, _I am not your father_. It's a hell of a lot easier to marry a muggle-born than to marry a half-breed. Hell, Snape's dad was a muggle without a drop of magical ability in him. _It's not the same for me_. I wouldn't marry you even if I wanted to."

"And you don't?" she asked flatly.

"No, I don't," he lied through his teeth, because there was nothing he would like more than to be married with her and be able to live openly with her. But the reality was just too much to expose her to. They might get something which passed for approval here between these walls, but outside of that – no, he wouldn't expose her to that.

"I don't believe you," she said, her voice trembling as she tried to deny what he was saying so convincingly.

"Then you're just as much of a child as you were when I first met you," he said harshly, emphasis on _first met_ rather than _first got involved with_; the difference was about seventeen years. He could see the tears well in her eyes and wanted to take her in his arms. But she had to face the truth; really, he was doing this for her own good.

"Screw you, Remus," she spat at him. "I'm sorry I ever got involved with you," she flung at him, hoping she could hurt him as much as he had hurt her. From the stoic look on his face, it didn't seem to have the slightest affect, and she recalled all the times he had told her he loved her and that he wouldn't leave her. What had all that been about? A moment of weakness when he had been lonely?

Lupin let her go although every nerve in his body cried out to go after her. _It's better this way_, he told himself. He couldn't stop certain people from looking down on her now that she had been with a werewolf, but maybe there was still someone out there for her that could give her a normal life – a husband and children without the shame that came from being with a half-breed... and such an old, poor, dangerous one at that.

* * *

"You're taking a ridiculous stance on this, Remus. She doesn't care. Hell, she cares a lot more thinking that you don't love her. I've got a right mind to set that girl straight."

Lupin sighed. "It won't do any good, Molly. I wouldn't marry her even if she did come back. And it's better this way. And I can't believe I'm hearing this from you, of all people. I seem to recall you telling me not to as much as look at your daughter."

"Yeah – well – that was before I realised how much you loved her," Molly admitted.

"As opposed to being a pervert who had a thing for students?" Lupin offered, almost good-naturedly. He had run into so much misunderstanding about his feelings towards Tonks and his intentions towards his students in general that he was almost forgiving of those parents who had thought – and still thought – the worst.

"I'm sorry," Molly said, admitting to a rare error of judgement. "I thought –"

"It's OK, Molly. If I was in your position, I'd probably think the same thing."

"Doesn't mean that it can't hurt to know what people are thinking," Molly said. "Which brings me back to what people are thinking. That you're a freaking idiot and putting far too much value on this too-old-too-poor-too-dangerous crap."

"Well, I am –"

"She doesn't give a damn how much older you are. Hell, Bill's eight years older than Fleur – and everyone knows that the older you get, the less the age gap matters, so really, you've hardly got any bigger a gap then them. And you know the limits to other people's safety around you better than most full-humans do – just look at how nasty Snape can get. And she doesn't give a shit about your economic status – she's doing quite well for herself as an Auror, and she'll inherit a bucketload from her parents."

"I don't want to be supported by my wife."

"A-ha! So you _do_ want to marry her!" Molly said triumphantly. Lupin looked away, furious that he'd allowed himself to be caught in her trap. "And that's sexist claptrap. Whoever is most able to support the household should support the household, gender be damned. I thought you were more-open-minded than that. Or is all that bitching you do about how people refused to look beyond their own entrenched ideas rubbish?"

"Of course it wasn't," Lupin said through gritted teeth, inwardly fuming. But then – Molly had had over twenty years, starting with Bill, worth of children to learn to outsmart. He supposed a man who had been virtually alone since his parent's death almost twenty years ago had no chance about such a woman once she'd had her mind made up.

On second thought – Molly might be able to outsmart him, but she couldn't make him change his mind. "Dumbledore's asked me to infiltrate the werewolves," Lupin said, considering this to be the final word on the matter.

Molly gasped at that. "Remus – you can't be serious – you'll never pull it off! You're too well known personally – and even if you weren't – you'll stink of civilisation to them."

"Like I stink of animal to most humans?" he asked, this time not bothering to mask his bitterness. "Dumbledore needs someone to try and get them onside and I'm uniquely suited to help him." Like Sirius, he often felt that it was the only thing he had to offer the Order.

* * *

"You can't go! I forbid it!"

"In case you hadn't noticed in the last twenty years, Dora, I'm an adult and I can make my own decisions."

"And I don't get a say?" Tonks asked tearfully.

"No, you don't. This is exactly what I've been talking about. You just don't get what it's like to be me. You have this awesome job where you get to contribute so much towards defeating Dark Forces. You don't know what it's like that I can offer hardly anything to anyone. Teaching was one of the few things I was good at, and now I can't do that ever again. If I can get even one of my kind onto our side, then I would actually have achieved something."

"One of your kind," Tonks repeated flatly.

"Yes, one of my kind. I'm a half-breed. Dora." God, he wished he could bring himself to call her Tonks, but he had known her for too long – he may as well try addressing any of the Weasleys by their last name. "I've been trying to tell you that for the last six years. Look, I think we really need some time apart. I think it will make you realise how much happier you'll be without me."

"I had five years to do that," she cried. "Please – Remus – don't do this. Stay. No-one cares that you can't contribute anything."

As soon as the words were out of her mouth, she knew they were the wrong thing to say. "Even you admit that there's nothing else I can contribute," he said flatly. "How would you feel if you were living off charity – and it _is_ charity, Dora, because I'm not doing anything to earn it. At least this way I feel like I can accept things after I'm done."

"If you survive, you mean." Though the two women hadn't vocally shared their opinions, they shared the belief that Lupin had little chance of mingling with wild werewolves; the mark of being highly educated, having tried – and with a limited degree of success – to integrate himself with humans was too obviously on him, as obvious as the opposite was on werewolves who had hunted and killed and lived wild from the get-go.

"If I survive," Lupin agreed. Though he would never admit it to anyone else – and didn't much like admitting it to himself, as it was such cowardice – there was something pleasing about the idea of being killed in the line of duty. Then he would never have to deal with the bigotry against werewolves, not to mention the tearing pain of transforming every month, and he might even, in time, be remembered as a hero.

She stared at him long and hard, realising that he had every intention of going through with this inane plan of his. Something told her that if Dumbledore _had_ approached him, instead of the other way around, he hadn't taken much convincing. He was determined to do this thing that he was uniquely suited to – or die trying. "Fine," she spat. "Don't expect me to wait for you."

"I wish you hadn't," he replied sadly.


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter Ten**

_Hey, guys! Thanks for reading! Recognisable dialogue is lifted directly from the end of Half-Blood Prince and is Rowling's own, word-for-word, added for authenticity. No copyright infringement intended._

If the pain of Sirius dying had been one thing, the pain of Dumbledore dying was another entirely. Sirius had been a friend, Dumbledore a mentor – _everyone's_ mentor.

And now Dumbledore was dead. Killed by one of their own – Severus Snape. Lupin wished he had killed him when he'd been in a fighting rage three years ago at Hogwarts after finding out that Snape had been spiteful enough not only to get him fired, but to out his relationship with Tonks.

And he was outed as a spy of Dumbledore's, too. Lupin knew he could never make contact with the werewolves again. He had been on shaky ground as it was, but now they all knew that he was there to try and recruit them to the Order – which he had singularly failed at. Tonks and Molly had both been right. He had stunk too much of a werewolf who was too civilised, too human.

He had lost everything.

And just to make things worse, Greyback – the werewolf who had bitten him – had attacked Bill Weasley. Greyback had embraced his condition with monstrous glee, feeding all month long and not just at the full moon, to a point that he was always in a partial state of werewolfishness. Even though it hadn't been a full moon when he had bitten Bill, he had still managed to inflict the cursed scars of a werewolf on Bill's face, and they were unsure what this meant for Bill.

"There will probably be some contamination, Arthur," Lupin admitted to Bill's father. "It is an odd case; possibly unique... we don't know what his behaviour might be like when he wakes up..."

"Of course, it doesn't matter how he looks... it's not r – really important," Molly said. "But he was a very handsome little b – boy... always very handsome... and he was g – going to be married!"

Fleur's head jerked up at that, her eyes sparkling with anger and determination. "What do you mean, 'e was _going_ to be married?" she demanded.

"Well – only that –" Molly stuttered, suddenly caught up in the hither-unknown fury of her son's fiancée.

"You theenk Bill will not wish to marry me anymore?" Fleur demanded. "You theenk, because of these bites, he will not love me?"

"No – that's not what I –"

"Because 'e will!" Fleur insisted. She drew herself up to her full height, tossing her long silvery hair behind her defiantly, and she couldn't have looked more Veela if she had reverted to the creature in its animal form. "It would take more zan a werewolf to stop Bill loving me!"

Lupin couldn't help feel uncomfortable where this conversation was heading. Something told him there were going to be some parallels between Bill and Fleur's relationship and his with Tonks. But it wasn't the same thing. For starters, Bill was unlikely to become a full werewolf like Lupin or their mutual sire Greyback, and would therefor be afforded a much more human life. And secondly, he and Fleur had been engaged before any of this happened, whereas Tonks had known what he was from the beginning and knew that he would never marry her or have children with her. It was a completely different situation.

He forced his attention back to the confrontation at hand; hopefully the two strong-willed women would stop anyone else from drawing comparisons to his own situation.

"Well, yes, I'm sure," Molly said defensively. "But I thought perhaps – given how – how he –"

"You thought I would not weesh to marry him? Or per'aps, you 'oped?" Fleur asked. "What do I care how 'e looks? I am good-looking enough for both of us, I theenk!" (That was true enough, Lupin thought.) "All these scars show is zat my husband is brave! And I shall do zat!" she added finally, snatching the ointment from Molly's hand and tending to Bill's injuries.

Her devotion to Bill stunned everyone, no-one more so than Molly. "Our Great Aunt Muriel has a very beautiful tiara – goblin-made – which I am sure I could persuade her to lend you for the wedding. She is very fond of Bill, you know, and it would look lovely with your hair."

"Thank you. I am sure zat would be lovely."

And then the two women were crying and embracing each other and no-one was exactly sure what had happened except that the intense dislike between the two women appeared to be over. And then, above all the fuss and tears, came Tonks's strained but clear voice. "You see! She still wants to marry him, even though he'd been bitten! She doesn't care!"

Lupin supposed he shouldn't be surprised. If she hadn't gotten over him in five years of separation, then why would she get over him with another year? Why would she be willing to get over him when Fleur had proven that she didn't care? When Molly herself had given the match her approval? "It's different," he insisted. "Bill will not be a full werewolf. The cases are completely –"

"But I don't care, either, I don't care!" she cried. She crossed the distance between them, grabbed the front of his shabby robes and shook them fiercely. "I've told you a million times –"

"And I've told _you_ a million times, that I am too old for you... too poor... too dangerous."

"I've said all along you're taking a ridiculous line on this, Remus," Molly said, patting her future daughter-in-law's shoulder. Lupin wished that the two women would go back to fighting; now they seemed united in their disapproval of Lupin's stance when it came to his relationship with Tonks.

"I am not being ridiculous. Dora deserves someone young and whole."

"But she wants _you_," Molly countered with a small smile, remembering how she had first disapproved of their relationship. She looked pointedly at her oldest son. "And, after all, Remus, young and whole men do not necessarily remain so."

"This is... not the moment to discuss it. Dumbledore is dead..."

"Dumbledore would have been happier than anybody to think that there was a little more love in the world," McGonagall interjected curtly. "And I believe he was the first person who understood that you feelings towards her had nothing to do with her being a student and everything to do with _her_."

Lupin could feel the heat of Tonks's pleading stare on him, and he felt forced to meet her eyes. "I want to speak to you alone," he said quietly. "Do you know where my flat is?" she nodded. She had gone there often enough after he had gone to join the werewolves; a glutton for punishment, perhaps, but it had been all she had had of him. "Meet me there."

Seconds later, they were in his apartment. "You've been here before," he said absently. "I can smell you." She nodded guiltily. She had forgotten just what a supernatural sense of smell he had; no much so that he could tell the difference between her lingering smell from past visits and the smell of her in front of him. "This is where I live," he said flatly. "This is the life I can afford. I'll stay at your place if you want – I won't subject you to this place – but I won't take anything else from you. I'll be your older, shabby husband. Is that really what you want?"

"You know it is! And it's obviously something you've thought about," she said, a touch triumphantly, because someone who thought things through as deeply as Lupin did didn't come up with a decision like 'I'll stay at your place' off the top of his head.

He shrugged. "I've thought about what I'm willing to have you pay for," he admitted. "I won't subject you to this – _dump_ –" he choked out the word, "but I won't have you buying anything for me, either. Is that understood?" she nodded. "I'm serious, Dora. You need to support yourself but I won't have you supporting me. And I'm hardly going to be the escort you'd want at a Ministry function."

"I don't care!"

"You keep saying that," he said tiredly. "But I don't think you really get it."

"_You_ keep saying that," she retorted. "But _I_ don't think you really get that _I_ get it. I _know_ you're not my dad, Remus. I _know_ marrying a half-breed is a hell of a lot further down the scale than marrying a muggle-born. I _know_ how much flak I'll get for marrying you – I got it enough just for being involved with you when I was almost seventeen. I have some idea of how much worse this is in the eyes of someone like Dolores Umbridge. And I keep telling you: _I don't care_."

"What about your parents? They're hardly likely to approve."

"Yeah, well, you know what? You may not be my dad, but he and mum aren't my grandparents, either. They're not going to disown their only child for marrying someone they disapprove of. Mum's many things, but she's not a hypocrite. There'll always be a part of her that will know she did the same thing as her parents did to her if she disowned me, and she'll know it. She won't disown me."

"What about children?"

"You made your stance on that pretty clear, Remus."

"I'd be willing to turn a blind eye if you had an affair," he suggested. He'd done a lot more thinking about marriage with her than he was willing to let on, and he knew that the law would legally recognise any children Tonks had if married to him as his; it seemed like a realistic solution to the fact that it wasn't a risk he was willing to take, even if he could, given it seemed that he was sterile.

Tonks gave him a huffy look. "I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that," she said.

"You might change your mind."

"I might change my mind about marrying you if you keep that claptrap up."

"Really?" he asked, half-hopefully, half-worried.

"No. There's no getting rid of me now." Perhaps if he had remained firm in his refusal during his emotional weakness over Dumbledore's death... but she knew now that he loved her, and wanted to marry her – enough that he had put serious thought into it, even if he had just considered it a pipe dream at the time.

He bit his lip. "I wish you would find someone else, Dora," he said hoarsely, choking out the words when he wanted to take her in his arms.

"No, you don't. You only _think_ that you should because you feel this dumb-assed obligation to isolate yourself from the world. Well, guess what? The world doesn't care – or at least not a fair few people in it. And McGonagall has a point. Dumbledore would be pleased to know that there was a little more love in the world."

He closed his eyes, thinking for what felt like an eternity – although she knew he had already ninety percent made up his mind; he wouldn't have brought her here if he had no intention of being with her. "Alright, you win," he said. "I'll marry you."

"You don't have to make it sound like it's a war, me versus you in who gets their way."

He managed a guilty smile and took her hand. "Come with me," he said, leading her through the small, shabby apartment to the bedroom. He retrieved a small box from the dresser; it was of little enough value that it wasn't worth stealing, although Lupin would have been devastated if it _had_ been stolen. "This was my mother's," he said quietly. While far from showy, the silver band with its small bluster of diamonds was very tasteful. "I know it doesn't compare with anything in the Black family vault, but she always said that any woman who was fixated on expensive jewellery as a show of love didn't deserve mine."

"Your mum sounds very wise."

"She was. You would have liked her." He took her left hand. "Dora, marry me," he said quietly.

"Yes! I've course! I've wanted to marry you for six years!" she yelled. She wriggled her fingers expectantly.

He laughed. "Easy, love. When Sirius was a dog he was less enthusiastic than you." He slid the ring onto her finger. It was a perfect fit. "I wish mum would have known you," he said. "She would have liked you."

* * *

"Absolutely not. I forbid it."

_Told you_, Lupin projected his thoughts onto his fiancée – who may not be his fiancée for much longer. "And don't you use that mind-reading crap with her, Remus Lupin," Andromeda snarled far more effectively then her hopefully-never-would-be-son-in-law ever had. "You want to say something; you can say it so we can all hear."

"I told Dora that's what you'd say," Lupin said.

"Then why the hell'd you ask her to marry you?" Andromeda narrowed her eyes at her daughter, who could be just as strong-willed as she was – and her sisters were, although all in vastly different ways. She would not have put it past her daughter to wear Lupin down until he agreed to marry her in a moment of weakness – and what better moment of weakness than the death of his former Headmaster and mentor? "This was your crackpot idea, wasn't it? You _idiot_. You'll be marrying far beneath you."

His hand clasped in hers, Tonks could feel Lupin flinch. Like so many others who knew their place in society, it was one thing for him to say she would be marrying beneath her; it was another for Andromeda to say it, and it such a scathing tone. She would take insults to her own intelligence, but not her fiancée's integrity. "_You_ did," she countered.

"Marrying your father is not the same as marrying a – a –"

"Half-breed?" Lupin offered. Andromeda scowled at him, and he understood what Tonks had meant; she knew perfectly well that she had married beneath her, at least by her family's standards, and with great defiance, and if it hadn't been to the same degree as her daughter wanted to, she would be a hypocrite to treat Tonks the same way her own parents had treated her.

"For Merlin's sake, can't you talk some sense into her?" Andromeda pleaded.

"Like your parents tried to talk some sense into _you_?" Lupin asked laconically. "Believe me, Andromeda, I know what I'll be dumping her into – far more than she does. If I thought I had a hope in hell of talking some sense in her, I would have. I _have _tried. The only thing that will work is convincing her that I don't love her – and I'm not that good an actor. Look, we're going to be married and I know you're not your parents. You're going to have to get used to it and I'd really appreciate it if you were OK with it from the beginning."

Andromeda just scowled as deeply and hatefully as either of her sisters could. But something told both Tonks and Lupin that she would come around eventually – both of them would. After all, Tonks was their only daughter, and Andromeda was hardly in the same bigoted, unforgiving league as her parents.

* * *

"Remus!_ Harder_!" Tonks screamed, raking her nails deeply down his back, drawing blood. Lupin roared like a conquering animal at the embrace. Tonks could be just as wild as he could be. He pumped her hard like a maniac, grinding his hips against hers. She wrapped her legs tightly around his waist as he rode her furiously to a mutual climax.

After he was finished, he rolled off her and lay on his stomach, panting. "Wow," he said, grinning. "I've never been so horny in my life – and believe it or not, I was once a sixteen-year-old boy."

Tonks smiled lovingly at him. She knew why he was so horny; she had mixed in a lust potion in with his emphasised which had enhanced his already animal-like libido. (After making damn sure that it wouldn't interfere with his Wolfsbane; she was aware that there were many potions that negated the potion, or even reversed its effects; not this one.) He was even more insatiable than usual. Two days into their 'honeymoon' (he had been telling the truth when he'd said he wouldn't take anything from her, which included her paying for an exotic holiday that he couldn't afford) and they'd already consummated their marriage over a dozen times. She'd never thought there really was too much of a good thing. And then she would think about those lonely days and nights, both in their years of separation after they had first gotten involved and the months following Sirius's death and their marriage, and she thought that it was totally worth it.

And she had, in secret, been taking a fertility potion. She had no idea if Lupin, and werewolves in general, were sterile, but she hoped that a fidelity potion might prove his belief to be wrong.

She knew how furious he would be if he found out. She knew how he felt about having children. But she reasoned that once she _was_ pregnant, he would come around. And if worst came to worst and he was capable of passing on his condition, well, so what? It would only make his child _half_-werewolf, and he, as a full werewolf, was the most gentle, decent man she had ever known – when he wasn't feeling sorry for himself.

She wanted a child so badly, and she was willing to undermine her husband's wishes to get one.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter Eleven**

_Thanks for reading, guys! Recognisable dialogue comes from Deathly Hallows; no copyright infringement intended._

_Note: My beta, Richard's Confessor, said she found Andromeda annoying in this chapter. That wasn't my intention - I saw her as a mum who had high hopes for her daughter and as such while she accepted Lupin as her son-in-law after an internal struggle, the idea of them having a child was repulsive and highly dangerous. I see her as very strong-willed and protective of what she sees as 'hers' - kind of like Bellatrix, only with vastly different values. Anyway, let me know what you think. And special thanks to Richard's Confessor for getting my chapters back to me so quickly - any delays are my fault in the writing._

_-HPFG.  
_

"You idiot! You stupid – irresponsible – idiot girl!" Lupin raged at his wife. He could see it as clearly as if it was written on her face; she had gone behind his back and actively encouraged a pregnancy that she had known he hadn't wanted.

And now she had God knew what growing inside her.

He thought quickly. He had done a lot of research into preventing and terminating a pregnancy should the worst happen. There weren't a lot of options available to him in the magical community – their population being so low, they weren't big on preventing or terminating a conception – and so he had sought information from the muggle community. "I'll find a muggle doctor who'll do an abortion," he said.

Her eyes flashed dangerously that he had so much as dared suggest it. "_No_," she said.

"_Yes_. You knew from the beginning I didn't want children."

"What you _want_ and what you _get_ are two different things," she said.

"You can't be serious. Do you have _any_ idea what you'll be exposing yourself to? Werewolves aren't supposed to breed, Dora."

"Says you. You're a half-breed. I'm full human. That means there's a seventy-five percent chance that nothing will go wrong."

She had pulled the number out of her ass, and even if there was some truth to it, Lupin still didn't like those odds – by her own admission, that meant there was a twenty-five percent chance that something _would_ go wrong. And when you were talking about a vicious animal, that mean a _lot_ could go wrong. "Dora, please – I'm begging you," he pleaded with her.

"I want a child, Remus."

"Then you should have had an affair. It's not too late for you to do that. Get rid of this baby and have an affair. I'll understand."

She slapped him, tears welling in her eyes. "Do I mean _that_ little to you that you'd see me with another man?"

"Of course you don't! Dora, you mean _everything_ to me. That's why I don't want you to have this child. You have no idea what it could do to you. I couldn't live with myself if you got hurt."

"Well, I couldn't live with myself if I _killed my child_, Remus," she countered. "It's my body. You can't make me give it up."

_Maybe not_, Lupin thought. _But I can sure as hell try to convince you_.

* * *

"You foolish girl!" Andromeda screamed at her daughter. "I thought I raised you smarter than that! Get rid of it."

"No," Tonks said defiantly.

"Remus, talk some sense into that idiot you married."

Lupin's expression was grim. "You think I haven't tried?" he asked. "I'd rather see her pregnant to someone else than to me."

Andromeda brightened. "Well, there's your solution. Have a termination, dear, and try again with someone... less risky."

"No!" Tonks screamed. Merlin, do you know what you're asking of me? "

"We're asking you to put yourself first, Dora. You have no idea how complicated this pregnancy could be."

"And it could be a breeze," Tonks countered. "You're both being over-protective. You can't make me give up my baby."

"I did try," Lupin said. "I don't want her to have this baby any more than you do. Maybe even less. I know what I'm capable of. If it's inherited any of my wolf side, then –" he broke off, shuddering.

"You can sense these things?" Andromeda asked. "I thought you guys responded to your own kind."

"It's not that simple. I'm not sensing anything, but that doesn't mean she's carrying a human." He sank into a chair and brought his knees up to his chest, wrapping his arms around his legs like a child. "I should have been more careful," he said. "I should have realised how badly she wanted a child. I shouldn't have just assumed that I was sterile. Oh, God, if something happens to her, it will be my entire fault."

Andromeda happened to share Lupin's opinion that he should have taken more care and not just assumed that he was sterile, but he was so distraught that she couldn't help but have a little sympathy for him. She had no doubt that if something did happen to his wife, then he would take full responsibility, deserved or not. And Tonks was the one who had gone to the effort of conceiving, behind her husband's back, no less. "You would have stopped it if you'd known what she was up to," Andromeda said. "You couldn't have known what she was going to do."

"But I _should_ have. I should have known how baldy she wanted a baby. I just thought she had accepted it when I said I didn't want children." _Or maybe she knew that I did and thought I wouldn't mind if she went behind my back_. "I keep thinking about what could happen to her. What kind of shitty husband am I that I didn't see this coming?"

Andromeda tentatively put her hand on his shoulder. "It's not your fault," she said.

* * *

"I don't know which of the two the bigger idiot was," Andromeda raved to Ted that evening. "Her for ignoring how dangerous it could be for her to have his child, or him for not realising how desperate she was and being more goddamn careful. Not to mention the fact that this whole disaster will bring disgrace to her – and to us."

"I thought you brought enough disgrace to yourself when you married me," Ted said mildly.

"You _would_ think something like that," she snapped. A muggle-born, he had never quite understood the nuances of the pecking order of the magical community – he got that a Black like her was considered to be way above a muggle-born like him, but he didn't get just how shameful mixed-breed marriages were, especially when that half-breed was a werewolf.

"Well, you said he said he couldn't sense anything," Ted pointed out.

"He also said that that doesn't mean she's carrying a human," Andromeda reminded him. "Oh, God, how could he be so thoughtless? Why did he have to think with his dick instead of his brain? Pretty fucking stupid for a Professor."

"Dromeda –"

"_Don't_ try and placate me, Ted," she said stonily. "He's disgraced and endangered her. I wish we'd never met him. I wish – I wish – why couldn't she have ended up with a nice boy like Charlie Weasley? Why did she have to be so infatuated with – with a goddamn _animal_?"

Ted Tonks took his wife in his arms to comfort her. "Whatever happens, we'll deal with it," he said soothingly. "What's done is done. It can't be taken back now. All we can do is be there for her and try and convince her that a termination is the right thing."

"We never will," she said tearfully. "She's so in love with him that she won't even think about destroying something she feels was conceived in that love."

Lupin hadn't meant to eavesdrop on his in-laws, but he had been passing the room and his supernatural sense of hearing had picked up every word. While it was only what he had thought himself, it still killed him to hear his wife and him being discussed that way. _Thoughtless. Idiot. Disgrace_. He considered himself to be all those things, but hearing Andromeda say them was all the worse. He _had_ been thoughtless, he _had_ been an idiot, and he _had_ brought disgrace to not only Tonks but her parents – people who had been a friend to him when they had known full well what he was. And if that's what her parents were saying about him, knowing full well that he loved her even though he shouldn't, then what would everyone else be saying about them once word got out that he'd gotten her pregnant?

He should never have married her. He certainly should never have allowed her to get pregnant. She was better off without him.

He couldn't stay here. He couldn't be around her, and he certainly couldn't sponge off her parents hospitality, even thought Andromeda had insisted that they stay here; her profession, before she had given it up to raise her daughter, had been as a Healer; Tonks wasn't likely to get better care at St. Mungos, and this way, she would be tended to by someone who at least respected her right to have this baby, even if they thought she was an idiot for wanting to.

Yes, she would be fine with Andromeda and Ted – as fine as she could be. They could take better care of her than he could – after all, they were right in the fact he should never have gotten involved with her.

* * *

"No! I don't believe you!" Tonks screamed hysterically when her mother informed her that her husband had walked out on her. "You're making it up! You never wanted me to marry him!"

"No, I didn't, but I wouldn't lie to you over something like that. He's left." Andromeda handed over the note that Lupin had left.

_Dora, my love,_

_Marrying you was a mistake. I should never have allowed my emotions to get the better of me in a moment of weakness. Being married to me will bring you nothing but shame and heartbreak, and I can't continue doing that to you. You're better off without me and I seriously wish you'd reconsider this child._

_Remus._

Tonks crumpled the paper in her hand, and her face crumbled in grief. She had known he wasn't happy with her pregnancy, but she hadn't thought that he would _leave_. It was like someone had turned off a light in her heart. She felt achingly empty.

"He has a point," Ted said. "We all wish you'd reconsider this baby. You'll find someone else, Dora."

She stared at her father. He had loved her mother for almost thirty years, been willing to accept what she would be losing for marrying a muggle-born... and yet he couldn't understand how his daughter could do the same thing. "Don't you get it?" she asked hysterically. "This is the only thing I have left. I've lost my husband. I won't lose my child."

* * *

"I am Remus John Lupin, werewolf, sometimes knows as Moony, one of the four creators of the Marauders Map, married to Nymphadora, usually known as Tonks, and I taught you how to produce a Patronus, Harry, which takes the form of a stag," Lupin recited to Harry, Ron and Hermione to prove he was who he said he was.

Harry lowered his wand. "Oh, all right. But I had to check, didn't I?"

"Speaking as your ex-Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, I quite agree that you had to check. Ron, Hermione, you shouldn't be so quick to lower your defences."

After he had walked out on his wife – his _pregnant_ wife, no less – Lupin had tracked down the trio with the vague idea that he would join them on whatever mission Dumbledore had left for Harry. He filled the three in on everything that had happened since Bill and Fleur's wedding – news they were completely starved for since being on the run. Scrimgeour had been killed with Thicknesse replacing him as a figurehead Minister of Magic while Voldemort controlled things from behind the scenes. His own in-laws had been targeted, although Lupin could take small consolation out of the fact that Ted and Andromeda had incurred the Death Eaters wrath for their part in helping Harry escape from his aunt and uncle's place and not because their daughter had married a werewolf.

"Why didn't Voldemort just declare himself Minister for Magic?" Ron asked.

Lupin laughed at that. "He doesn't need to, Ron. Effectively he _is_ the Minister, but why should he sit behind a desk at the Ministry? His puppet, Thicknesse, is taking care of everyday business, leaving Voldemort free to extend his power beyond the Ministry. Naturally many people have deduced what has happened: there has been such a dramatic change in Ministry policy in the last few days, and many are whispering that Voldemort must be behind it. However, that is the point: they whisper. They daren't confide in each other, not knowing whom to trust; they are scared to speak out, in case their suspicions are true and their families are targeted. Yes, Voldemort is playing a very clever game. Declaring himself might have provoked open rebellion: remaining masked has created confusion, uncertainty and fear."

He broke the news to Hermione as gently as he could that Voldemort and his Death Eaters, under the guise of Ministry respectability, were targeting muggle-borns, maintaining that since magical ability was inherited, muggle-born witches and wizards must have stolen the ability, and therefor weren't _real_ witches and wizards but frauds to be prosecuted – or _persecuted_. Hermione took it was surprising grace; she had always known that 'her kind' would be among the first to be targeted should Voldemort get any amount of power. "What about your father-in-law?" she asked. "Isn't he a muggle-born?"

Lupin flinched at the reference to the wife and in-laws that he had left behind. "Andromeda's still a Black, even a Black who married a muggle-born. The name still holds a lot of clout. That should afford him a degree of safety, certainly more than what others have been afforded." He took a deep breath and launched into his reason for arriving at Grimmauld Place. "I'll understand if you can't confirm this, Harry, but the Order is under the impression that Dumbledore left you a mission."

"He did, and Ron and Hermione are in on it and they're coming with m," Harry replied.

"Can you confide in me what the mission is?"

"I can't, Remus, I'm sorry, If Dumbledore didn't tell you, I don't think I can."

"I thought you'd say that. But I might still be of some use to you. You know what I am and what I can do. I could come with you to provide protection. There would be no need to tell me exactly what you were up to."

There was a look in Harry's eyes that Lupin had been banking on; his supernatural strength, vision, hearing and smell would make for a good bodyguard and general protector. Not to mention his knowledge of the Dark Arts and how to defend yourself against them. Having a werewolf having your back was no small thing. But it wasn't Harry who spoke next; it was Hermione. "What about Tonks?" she asked.

"What about her?"

"Well, you're married! How does she feel about you going away with us?"

"Dora will be perfectly safe. She's at her parents place. As I said, Andromeda's still a Black, which makes Dora a Black, too. She's as safe as anyone can be in these times."

"Remus... is everything alright... you know... between you and –" Hermione began tentatively.

"Everything is fine, thank you," Lupin said tightly. He saw Hermione turned pink at his shortness. The seconds slipped by agonisingly slowly before he finally said, "Dora is going to have a baby."

"Oh, how wonderful!" Hermione said.

"Excellent!" Ron explained.

"Congratulations," from Harry.

Lupin gave an artificial smile, knowing that it must look more like a grimace than a smile, and said, "So... do you accept my offer? Will three become four? I cannot believe that Dumbledore would have disapproved, he appointed me your Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, after all. And I must tell you that I believe that we are facing magic many of us have never encountered or imagined."

"Just to be clear," Harry clarified. "You want to leave Tonks at her parent's house and come away with us?"

"She'll be perfectly safe there, they'll look after her," Lupin said. "Harry, I'm sure James would have wanted me to stick with you."

"Well, I'm not. I'm pretty sure my father would have wanted to know why you aren't sticking with your own kid, actually," Harry said bluntly.

The colour drained from Lupin's face for being spoken so bluntly to – and by his former charge, no less. He constantly felt guilty for walking out on Tonks, and had to keep reminding himself that it was for the best. "You don't understand," he said.

"Explain, then,"

Lupin swallowed. "I – I made a grave mistake in marrying Dora. I did it against my better judgement and I have regretted it very much ever since."

"I see," Harry said. "So you're just going to dump her and run off with us?"

Lupin sprang to his feet, toppling his chair backwards and he glared at Harry so fiercely that the younger man stepped back in fright. "Don't you understand what I've done to my wife and my unborn child? I should never have married her. I've made her an outcast! You have only ever seen me amongst the Order, or under Dumbledore's protection at Hogwarts. You don't know how most of the wizarding word sees creatures like me! Don't you see what I've done? Even her own family is disgusted by our marriage, what parents want their only daughter to marry a werewolf? And the child – the child -" Lupin seized handfuls of his own hair and began tearing it out, so distressed was he over the thought of what he had done. "My kind doesn't usually breed! It will be like me, I am convinced of it – how can I forgive myself, when I knowingly risked passing on my condition to an innocent child? And if my some miracle, it is not like me, then it would be better off, a hundred times so, without a father of which it must always be ashamed!"

"Remus!" Hermione said, on the verge of tears, shocked that a man that she so admired could think and act like that. "Don't say that – how could anyone be ashamed of you?"

"Oh, I don't know, Hermione," Harry said with uncharacteristic viciousness. "I'd be pretty ashamed of him." Lupin looked as if Harry had hit him. "If the new regime things muggle-borns are bad, what will they do to a half-werewolf whose parents are in the Order? My father died trying to protect my mother and me, and you reckon he'd tell you to abandon your kid to go on an adventure with us?"

"How – dare you? This is not about desire for – for danger or personal glory – how dare you suggest such a –"

"I think you're feeling a bit of a daredevil," Harry said. "You fancy stepping into Sirius's shoes. I'd never have believed this – the man who taught me to fight Dementors – a coward."

Lupin raised his wand to Harry, ready to curse him for his being insubordinate, but Hermione interjected. "Remus, don't," she pleaded. "What's done is done. Your wife needs you. Your _child_ needs you. You can't just abandon them like – like –"

"A coward," Lupin said weakly. "I'm a coward."

"I didn't say that," Hermione said, although she was inclined to agree with his assessment. But it was almost as distressing to see her former DADA teacher so broken and guilt-ridden as anything else they had come up against in the past few months.

"You didn't have to. I walked out on my wife. Didn't even say it to her face, I left her a note. I'd be surprised if she even took me back."

"You don't know what she'll do. And you owe it to her to try," Hermione said gently. "Whatever shame she's endured already – and that wasn't your fault, it was the fault of small-minded people who think anyone who's not pure-human and pure-blooded is scum – won't go away just because you left her. So you may as well be by her side. We all have our battles to fight. Yours has to be to support your wife through this period."

* * *

Lupin traipsed around London for days, thoroughly miserable. Every time he thought he'd come to a decision as what to do, he started to panic. Finally he decided to just go to the Tonks house and play it by ear.

Andromeda answered the door. "Leave, before she realises you're here," she said, not entirely unkindly; he could hear the gratitude in her voice, thankful that he had walked out on her.

"I need to see my wife," Lupin insisted.

"You need to go," Andromeda said. "Please. She's just starting to get over you. A few more weeks and we might be able to convince her to have a termination. You may even be able to get an annulment and she can marry someone more suitable for her."

They both knew that was a lie; if she hadn't gotten over him in the five years between seventeen and twenty-two, a few weeks would have made no difference. "Andromeda, let me in, before I knock you over."Andromeda reluctantly stepped aside so Lupin could charge through the front door. "Dora!" he yelled. "Dora, I need to see you!"

She was standing in the living room, and he was struck by how different she was in just a matter of weeks. She looked pale and stressed, and he guiltily knew that he was responsible for that. What happened to his marriage vows? _For better or worse, in sickness and in health... _He had been reluctant to marry her, but having married her, he should have made her his priority, done everything in his power to make her happy. Instead, he had tried to run away and needed to be told what-for by a bunch of seventeen-year-olds.

Her pregnancy was advanced enough to show ever-so-slightly, and he felt an immediately bond with his unborn child. How could he have left that? He strode over to her, took her hands in his and dropped to his knees, kissing her swollen belly. "Please, take me back," he begged. "Please, I'll do anything." He tilted his head to look up at her, his eyes swimming with tears.

"You won't leave me again?" she asked, clutching his hands tightly as if to physically stop him from running off again.

"No," he said. "I promise. Til death, remember?"


	12. Chapter 12

_Hey, guys! Sorry for the delay - I haven't felt like writing much and have been working on my blog and a L/G fic as well. But enjoy the update. Also, I had it in my head that Sprout's first name was Padoma, not Pomona, so hence any mistakes in there. Otherwise, enjoy!_

**Chapter Twelve**

"Remus, give me your wand."

"Sorry?"

"Your wand. Give me your wand. If you're serious about not leaving again, then you won't mind handing over your wand," Andromeda said patiently. "Oh, don't look so panicky. Ted and I are both here and so is Dora. I just want you to think twice before you run off again."

"I won't run off again," Lupin said with as much dignity as he could muster given that he had walked out on his pregnant wife – hardly the stuff that dignity is made of.

"Then give me your wand." Reluctantly, Lupin handed his wand over to his mother-in-law. He knew he had to play nice, at least for a while; he was living in his in-law's home, the home that he had walked out of only a few weeks ago. Andromeda and Ted were still angry with him, although Tonks was so grateful to have him back that she never rode him about his betrayal, though she had every right to.

"I've set you up a room, too," Andromeda said. "For the full moon. I don't know what you've done it the past but I've had the most powerful security spells put in place."

"I don't need security," he said. "The Wolfsbane keeps me in check."

"Yeah, I heard _all about_ how it kept you in check at Hogwarts," Andromeda said sarcastically, and Lupin was reminded as to how much she resembled her older sister. Lupin let it go; she had a right to be angry at him.

"I don't want to fight with you, Andromeda. I'm trying to do the right thing by Dora. She's happier with me being here; even you have to admit that."

"Why do you think I let you stay?" Andromeda said. Then she softened slightly. "I've arranged for red meat to be delivered every second day. I know you like it as fresh it you can get it."

"Thank you, I appreciate that."

"Whatever I may think of you personally, Remus, I do respect the fact that you've never bitten. We can afford to indulge in your tastes – at least as far as cows go – and I'd infinitely prefer that to you getting testy because you're not being fed properly."

"I – do not – well, thanks anyway," Lupin said, swallowing the urge to have a go at Andromeda for basically accusing him of not being able to keep his appetite in check when he didn't get a particular quality of meat. She was trying, even if she was doing it in an ignorant, mother-in-law-who-disliked-him way.

* * *

Lupin listened to his wife's breathing; the steady breathing of someone who was sound asleep. She was curled up in his arms, her back against his chest. His arm was around her waist, his hand resting on her swollen belly under her pyjama top – actually just a t-shirt coupled with tracksuit pants. Confident that she was dead to the world, he slid out of bed and pottered into the small sitting room that was attached to their bedroom.

Sinking into a chair by the window – he found comfort in looking at the moon, it had been so deeply linked with his life for so long that he strength from it even while hating it for the debilitating condition that it represented – he brought his knees up against his chest and gave himself over to the familiar panic. Every night he waited until Tonks was asleep before taking time out here, giving way to his fears without having to constantly keep up a facade that he _wasn't_ worried sick.

He knew Tonks didn't worry; he had discreetly read her thoughts. Either she was aware of something that he wasn't, or she was determined to see the best possible outcome. Either way, she didn't worry, and he couldn't bring himself to _make_ her worry by making her aware of just how worried _he_ was. So each night after she was asleep, he made his way to the sitting room to stare at the moon and indulge in his worry until he felt calm enough to go back to bed. So far, it was working, and Tonks didn't suspect that he was frightened – or at least not just _how_ frightened he was.

He was startled soon after by his father-in-law in the doorway. "Sorry, didn't mean to scare you," Ted said quietly. "I've heard you prowling around at night. I figure you must be pretty worried."

He stared balefully at his father-in-law. "You think?" he asked sarcastically.

"I know you're worried about her," Ted said understandingly. "And I know you're going above and beyond to hide that from her. But I've noticed, and so has Dromeda. And we do appreciate what you're doing. You're keeping Dora calm and happy. It's remarkably selfless."

"For someone who shouldn't have gotten her pregnant in the first place and shouldn't have walked out on her once I did?" Lupin asked.

"I'm not hear to guilt you, Remus," Ted said. "You seem to be doing a fine job of that all on your own. I'm worried about you. Dromeda and I both are, though she'll never admit it, not even to me. Dora needs you, which means _you_ need to find some way of dealing with all this worry you've got building inside you. She won't stay asleep every night. One night she's going to wake up and realise that you've been out here every night, worrying yourself sick."

"I can't help it. I keep thinking about what I am and what my child might be," he whispered hoarsely.

"I know. But you said so yourself, you can't sense anything. And I know a little bit about foetal development – that's how the baby is growing inside her, for you magical-borns." Magical borns might be floored as to how muggles got by without magic, but Ted was often floored as to just how ignorant magical-borns were as to the science behind anything. They tended to think that since a problem could be solved using magic, there was no reason to learn the _how_ and _why_ of it. "There's a lot of contention about how far along in a pregnancy constitutes life, but I'm inclined to believe that since she's passed three full moons without any trouble, there won't _be_ any trouble."

"You're just saying that."

"Remus, I know how badly you crave raw red meat, especially around the full moon. And you're adult enough to understand the craving and control it. If your son was even the smallest bit like you, don't you think they'd have the same cravings? Except they lack the understanding of _why_ they crave it, they would just... seek what they crave, by whatever means necessary. That's what you've been worried about. It's what _we've_ been worried about. But I think it that was the case, we'd know about it by now. Dora isn't even eating a significant amount of red meat, and I'm always nagging her that she doesn't have enough iron in her diet." Lupin visibly relaxed when Ted said this, his words making sense. "Look," he said. "I'm going to teach you a few of my prayers – Christian prayers, I mean."

"Muggle prayers?"

"Christianity is one of the beliefs muggles have," Ted explained. "And yes, it's to do with Christmas. You guys pinched it from us, Easter too. My mum was big on it and she never quite got over me being a wizard so she sent me a rosary every birthday, Christmas and Easter until she died. I'm going to teach you the prayers. Maybe it won't have the same effect for you, but it always makes me feel better when something feels unbearable. Like I've got someone watching over me, knowing that I'm trying to do the right thing." Lupin nodded. It sort of made sense, even if it was just believing in fairy tales. "OK, so it's two prayers," Ted said, handing over what to Lupin looked like a bunch of different-sized coloured beads strung together. "It's fairly complicated and I'm not going to give you a crash-course on Catholicism right now, but you basically say the same two prayers over and over, one per bead, until you've gone through the whole thing. Now repeat after me: Our father, who art in heaven..."

* * *

"Where'd you go?" Tonks asked sleepily when her husband slid into bed beside her. Ted had been right; eventually she would wake up and find that he wasn't there.

"Toilet," he murmured. Much to his surprise, he _did_ feel better. Those stupid muggle prayers actually took a weight of his shoulders, not to mention Ted's logic that if something were badly wrong with her pregnancy, it would have shown itself by now. "Don't mind me, love. Just go back to sleep. You need to remain rested." He threw his leg over hers and rested his hand over her stomach.

He hadn't meant for it to go any further than that, but he found himself nuzzling into the back of her. He had forgotten how good she smelled – how good she felt in his arms. "Remus," she murmured. It had been a long time since he had touched her with anything more than distracted affection; since before he had found out about the pregnancy. She nestled into him.

"Tell me to stop of you want," he breathed huskily into her ear.

_As if_, she thought. "Remus," she whispered. "Don't stop. _Don't stop_."

He moved his hand up the front of her body and started kissing her neck. Sighing with pleasure, she pushed her body back against his; it didn't take much rubbing her backside against his crotch to get him hard. "Dora," he grunted. He pulled his hand out from under her shirt and started undoing the buttons, stripping the top off her. He threw an Imperturbable Charm at the door – the first time he had bothered since coming here after learning of her pregnancy – and whispered to her, "Tell me what works for you." He continued to kiss her from behind, running his lips over her neck and back, running his hands over her front, rubbing her breasts, stroking her nipples... Tonks shuddered with desire. She squirmed involuntarily as her husband ran his hands and mouth over her body, needing nothing more than touching her to get worked up himself that was easy enough to tell from the growing erection against her bottom.

He wriggled out of his pants so he was only wearing his y-fronts and slid his hand down the front of her body, under the waistband of her pyjama bottoms, under the waistband of her panties, in between her thighs to her most sensitive of places... she yelped with unfettered lust when she felt his fingers caress her. "Remus!" she cried out. "_Oh, sweet Merlin..._"

"Stop," he pleaded when she tried to assist him in getting off the rest of her clothing; she was only making it take longer. He pulled off the material with ease so she was completely naked and the only thing standing in their way was his underwear. He twisted her neck around so he could kiss her full on the mouth while keeping her on her side, already knowing that she was too far into her pregnancy to find the missionary position comfortable. He continued to finger her as he kissed her, bringing her to an orgasm because he knew that once he was inside her, he wouldn't be able to show much restraint... as she bucked against him, he started to think about how much he wanted to go down on her, but that would mean missing out on feeling her back against his chest...

After a few minutes she climaxed, screaming before she went limp in his arms. He whipped off his y-fronts and eased himself into her with surprising restraint after muttering the incantation for a protective spell that would stop him from hurting the baby.

"Remus..." she cried again. Her fingers fluttered anxiously; he laced his through them and she gripped his hand tightly as if wanting to prove to herself that he husband was there, making love to her for the first time in months. He thrust in and out with as much restraint as he could manage; he was so painfully aroused that it didn't take much to stimulate him. How had he managed to lie next to her night after night without doing anything about it? How had he managed to become so caught up in his fears that he had all but forgotten this amazing, passionate woman inches away from him?

"Ahhhh – Dora – love – _ahhhhhh_..." he cried out as he buried himself to the hilt inside her and spilled himself. He held her in an iron grip and buried his face in her neck as he came, convinced that he'd never climaxed like that before and feeling the seconds were whizzing by as he emptied his desire in her. "God, I love you so much," he murmured.

It took him a few seconds to realise that she was crying. "Hey," he said gently, rolling her onto her back so he could look down at her. "My wife crying after I've made love to her is not the response I was after."

"I'm – sorry –" she stammered between choking sobs. "I – just – thought – I re-re-repulsed you."

Guilt flooded him. "You never repulsed me, Dora," he said. "I never meant to make you feel like you did. I've just been – I've been scared."

"About the baby?"

He nodded. "I've been a coward," he admitted.

"What changed?"

"Your dad," he said. "For a muggle-born, he knows a hell of a lot. Maybe Hermione was onto something when she said we ought to pay more attention to what muggles have to offer."

She giggled suddenly, intensely relieved that her husband's seeming lack of interest had been caused by worry about their baby and not disgust over her figure. "Remus. I can't believe you're thinking about my dad and a _teenager_ when you're in bed with me."

He climbed on top of her, putting the weight on his knees and elbows so he was pushing his body against her swollen belly. He kissed her deeply. "You don't want me to think about anything but you, then you'd better keep me distracted," he said. "I seem to have rediscovered my sex drive..."

* * *

"You seem very content," Ted remarked dryly a few days later. Lupin blushed deep red, which Ted found somewhat amusing. The man was a mere six years younger than him and Andromeda, but how he was squirming like a schoolboy caught breaking rules. "Not so stressed out?" Lupin mumbled something about paying Dora more attention, which Ted and Andromeda knew perfectly well; it was easy enough to detect an Imperturbable Charm, and since Lupin hadn't bothered to use one either when he had first come here or since he had returned, it was fairly obvious what he was using it for.

Not that Ted gave a damn. Andromeda was more concerned – she had always disapproved of her daughter's marriage, even more since Lupin had walked out on her – but even she had to concede that Tonks was looking a lot more content for having Lupin be more of a husband. "I'm glad," Ted said frankly. "I'm the first to admit I wish she had married a full-human, but she wanted _you_ and having married you, I'd rather she be happy in her marriage than not."

"Why are you being so nice about this?" Lupin asked suspiciously, because he had never heard someone be so approving of him, and it disturbed him.

"Because I know what it's like to love someone that society deems _way_ beneath you," Ted said. "And I need a favour from you. I have to go," he said. "I won't register with the Muggle-Born List on principle, and it won't be long before they're bursting down this door. And that will lead them straight to you and Dora, and I can't do that."

"I've brought this on you," Lupin said guiltily.

"No, you haven't. They would have come anyway. I'm better off being on the run – the way the Death Eaters feel about me – Hermione could marry Ron or Neville and they wouldn't give a damn because they're blood traitors, but for a muggle-born to marry a Black..." He shrugged as if it was of no concern to him that the Death Eaters would hate him for marrying a Black more than being a muggle-born. "Dora will be alright, at least for a while. No-one doubts her half-blood status, and almost everyone – including most of the Order – thinks you're running around somewhere having abandoned your wife. I think Kingsley's spreading the rumour about Paris, actually. But if they come here for me, then they'll realise you're here, and that she's pregnant, and that won't go very well for her. I have no doubt that they'll force a termination and not give a shit what they do to _her_ in the process."

"I'm sorry," Lupin said. "If I'd never married her –"

"Remus, please don't start this again. I need you to take care of her. I'm not worried about Dromeda. They might ostracise her, they might come after me and you and Dora, but they won't hurt her. But I need you to be there for Dora. I've seen the way she looks at you. She worships you. I know I didn't approve of this marriage, but I'm willing to admit that no-one can make her happy like you can – at least not when you're trying. If I know that you're looking after her, keeping her happy and nurtured, that will be a huge weight off my shoulders."

"Of course," Lupin said instantly. And the less Ted had distracted him, the better – Lupin was aware from his own experiences out in the world that was so controlled by the Death Eaters how dangerous it was out there. "I'll do everything in my power to protect her. And make her feel loved. You have my word."

Ted nodded. He may not have wanted this marriage, but that were married now, and he couldn't deny that no-one else would have made her happy the way he did – when he was trying. If anyone could keep her safe, keep her calm and keep her feeling loved, it was him.

* * *

Lupin rocked his wife gently. "He'll be fine," he said as convincingly as he could manage, because he knew what a black stain on the face of purebloodedness many of them felt Ted Tonks represented. The man wasn't far behind Harry Potter as far as the list of Undesirables went. "And I promised him I'd look after you. Keep you save and loved and calm. You won't make me go back on that on the first day, will you?"

Tonks gradually quietened in his arms, knowing that her husband was speaking the truth. She needed to stay calm for the sake of their baby. "You won't leave me too?" she asked tentatively.

"No," he said resolutely. "I know I haven't been the right thing by you in the past, but I'm here now and I'm not going to leave you ever again." He wrapped his arms around her swollen stomach. "You are my wife and the mother of my child and I will not leave you for anything." Especially in light of the fact that Ted had left precisely because coming for him here would draw the Death Eaters to him and Tonks. He had made Ted a promise that he would be there for his daughter; in light of the fact Ted had left in part because of his presence here, he owed it to the man to keep that promise.

* * *

"How are they holding up?" Pamona Sprout, who had been both Ted and Tonks's Head of House at Hogwarts, asked Lupin a few months later.

"Better than I had hoped," Lupin admitted. "But then, I think Andy knew this would happen – I can't believe I'm admitting I'm old enough to remember this – but I remember what a stir their marriage caused. I understand her parents did everything they could think of to have the marriage nullified. She must have lived with that threat all through the first war, and known that there was a good chance that it was only a matter of time this time around."

"And Nymphodora?"

"She knows it's not good for the baby for her to fret. And she knows that I won't leave her. It helps that she know hardly anyone knows I'm here – if Ted had said anything. We'd have had Death Eaters at the door long before now. That, and Andy toes my wand around just to remind us that she has it and I can't do much without it _here_, let alone defend myself out _there_."

Sprout gave a grim smile. "That's such a Slytherin thing to do," she said. Then, "I shouldn't say that about her. I always liked her, even before they got together. Did you know I knew about them the whole time?"

"I didn't, but that doesn't surprise me. Lily and James thought they were being discreet, too, and it turned out McGonagall knew about it before they even got together."

Sprout laughed at that. "_Everyone_ knew he had the hots for her," she pointed out. "We didn't get to be teachers by not knowing how to see through our student's attempts at subterfuge."

"Really? I kept my lycanthropy from you all for seven years."

"No, you didn't. At least, not from me. Or McGonagall. Sirius told Andromeda everything, remember? And Ted was always one of my favourites. Most of the staff knew; we just trusted Dumbledore's judgement. Like I said – we didn't get to be teachers by not knowing how to see through our student's attempts at subterfuge."

Lupin leaned back in his chair, feeling oddly deflated to find out twenty years after the fact that his attempts at subterfuge had been seen right through. "And I thought I was so clever."

"Students always do. I thought you'd have learnt that. Especially on account that you're the only teacher to do _two_ years as the DADA Professor in the last two decades." But Sprout was amused, and a little reminiscent.

"You didn't like me," Lupin remembered.

"You pinched my star student away from a star Quidditch player," Sprout pointed out. "Merlin, I can't believe I cared about that so much at the time."

"I was thirteen years older, her Professor, and, oh yeah, I pinched your star student away from a star Quidditch player," Lupin reminded her. "Though Charlie was a Gryffindor boy, too, so I never got why you put so much stock in their relationship."

"Didn't want her to end up with a Slytherin like Ted did," Sprout admitted.

"Are you two _still_ bad-mouthing us?" Andromeda asked. "I thought you liked me, Padoma."

"I did, for a Slytherin," Sprout conceded. "I was just telling Remus the lousy job Ted did of keeping it to himself. Honestly, you could tell by the way he behaved that he was head over heels in love with someone he ought not to be in love with and he damn well knew it – which, naturally, him being a muggle-born Hufflepuff, meant a Slytherin... and you were the only Slytherin who looked twice at anyone _not_ in Slytherin, let alone would _date_ one. Actually, Remus – they _did_ manage to get it past Slughorn... though I think that was more because of his refusal to contemplate such a thing than any talent either of you had at subterfuge," she said to Andromeda.

Both Lupin and Sprout could see some of the sadness disappear from Andromeda's face – at least for a little while – as she was engaged in memories of the last twenty-five years. As the conversation turned to days at Hogwarts – and days since – Lupin slipped into the room he shared with his wife, who was napping. He eased her into his arms. "Love, I know you're tired, but Pomona's here and I think you want to listen to this. They're yapping on about old times and I think you'll enjoy it." Like any good Head of House, Sprout had been a strong parental figure to first Ted, and then his daughter, and knew him better than most – certainly, she had known of Ted's magical life far better than his own parents had. And she was the type of Head who cared about her students long after they had left the hallowed halls of Hogwarts.

He carried Tonks into the living room and settled her onto the couch, her head in his lap. Sprout took note of the way she wrapped her arms around his thighs and the way he stroked her hair. No, she hadn't liked the idea of them being together when she had first heard about it – he had been her Professor, thirteen years older than her (strange how the same age gap seemed smaller with every year that they got older) and, well, he had pilfered her star student from a star Quidditch player... but there was no doubt that they were deeply in sync with each other. She couldn't think of anyone else who could keep the excitable, emotional Nymphadora Tonks – a woman who had made a public scene over their relationship in the wake of Dumbledore's death – not only calmed by falling asleep in his lap so soon after the news of her father's death. She might not have approved of the relationship, but there was no denying that he knew her and loved her like no-one else did – including Charlie Weasley.


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter Thirteen**

"I hate you, Remus Lupin! _Hate you! _I wishI'd never met you!"

Lupin didn't say anything in response to his wife's hysterical screams that she was hurling at him, although they hurt him deeply. Instead, he tightened his grip on her hands, wishing that he had a third arm to wrap supportively around her waist. She was in pain, so he tried not to take her abuse too personally. He kissed the top of her damn, sweaty head. "I love you," he said quietly, hoping that _some_ of his sentiments were getting through that cloud of pain and rage that she went through in waves, punctuated by feelings of remorse at treating her husband so badly.

Not to mention breaking or fracturing at least a dozen bones in his hands; every time a contraction came, she squeezed hands, and she had a surprisingly strong grip. He had a high tolerance to pain and superhuman healing abilities, but neither was a match for the pain his wife was able to inflict on him in her own pain.

"Wish I'd never met you!" she screamed again as a contraction tore through her body. Andromeda and Lupin agreed that they didn't dare take Tonks to St. Mungo's, although Tonks desperately needed the professional care and facilities of the magical hospital. But St. Mungo's was well and truly under the command of the Ministry, which in turn was under the command of Voldemort and his Death Eaters. It wouldn't take much for them to realise the child she was carrying was that of her werewolf husband – and then, as Ted had predicted, there was no telling what they might do to her in the process of getting rid of the child. So they had no choice but to settle for Andromeda's care – and in all fairness, Andromeda had once been a rising star in the world of Healing, eclipsing several established Healers in the year she had worked at St. Mungo's before becoming pregnant and dedicating her love to marriage and motherhood. If they couldn't have the luxury of St. Mungo's, they at least had Andromeda's expertise.

Andromeda was silently communicating with him using Legilimency so as not to frighten her daughter, and she was concerned. Births usually weren't this long, or this painful. They were both almost a hundred percent convinced that complications were being brought about by the cross-breed conception – and not having the expertise and facilities of St. Mungo's was exacerbating those complications.

Tonks screamed again. "Wish I'd never let you touch me – never let you do this to me!"

Lupin literally bit down on his tongue to prevent himself from reminding Tonks that he hadn't wanted a child and told her so from the beginning, and _she_ had been the one to push through with the idea. Now was _not_ the time to remind her of that. Instead, he just kept holding her hands and gritting through the pain."I love you," he told her over and over. "You can do this."

As the hours passed, she weakened from the effort. "Make it stop," she pleaded. "Please – Remus – I don't want this. I just want to die."

He was more worried about her weak pleadings than her angry rages. When she was angry, she'd had the strength to be angry. Now – "Dora, listen to me," he said firmly. "I did not stop fighting you after you pursued me for _eight years_ to have you quit on me now. You didn't want this, you should have thought about this before you made me love you. _I will not lose you now_ and if you quit on me, I swear to Merlin I will find that Resurrection Stone and bring you back just to throw in your face what you're missing. I'll have my son or daughter and you'll only be able to look on and not fully be a part of it. And I'll remarry," he added desperately, thinking that that was possibly an even worse scenario for Tonks than not being able to be a true part of her child's life.

Andromeda sent him a warning glare, and Lupin returned her a defiant one. Pleading didn't work, so maybe baiting her would. She had loved him and pursued him for eight years; the threat of him remarrying wouldn't go down well.

He was right. "I hate you," she muttered again, not quite up to her previous ravings, but a damn improvement on her pleadings to die.

* * *

It was over. Tonks had survived the ordeal and given birth to a baby boy who, from everything Lupin could sense – or not sense – was completely human. "Let me take a look at your hands," Andromeda said sympathetically. She had heard the bones crack at least twice, and was secretly impressed that her son-in-law hadn't been howling along with her daughter. She knew he had to have a high tolerance for pain, given he transformed into a werewolf and back on a monthly occasion, but even that wouldn't have braced him for having his hands squeezed for hours and the bones in them broken several times.

Lupin handed over his swollen, broken hands to her care. "Thank you," she said with quiet dignity, seeing the extent of the damage her daughter had done to him. "For not wavering, you must have been in agony. This will hurt a little, but it will be over soon," she said, waving her wand over his damaged hands. Lupin winced slightly as he felt the bones in them knit together; a Potion would have been easier, but they both knew how careful he had to be with Potions, because Wolfsbane didn't play nicely with many of them.

"You're welcome," he grunted. He flexed his fingers gingerly when he felt that the bones were whole again, if still agonisingly painful. But they were whole, which meant he could hold his son.

"You sure you don't need my supervision?" Andromeda asked tentatively. "I know you have plenty of experience with older children, but a baby is not the same as a student - even an eleven-year-old."

"You trusted me with Dora," he reminded her. It felt like it had been so long ago that he had played easily with the infant Tonks – he'd always had a knack with children, even babies, who seemed to respond to the animal in him as if he were a harmless, domesticated dog.

"Did I? I probably felt less possessive of my family back then," she mused. "I'll only be with Dora."

"Mmmm-hmmm." She could have said she'd be on the moon and Lupin would barely have paid her any attention. "Oh, Andy?" he asked as his mother-in-law started to leave the room. "What was Ted short for? Theodore or Edward?"

"Theodore."

"Theodore," Lupin repeated, staring at his newborn son with rapt attention, trying his father-in-law's name out on his son. "Theodore John Lupin. _Teddy_." It had a nice ring to it, a nice fit, like it was meant to be, like some higher power had decided eons ago on the existence of Theodore 'Teddy' John Lupin.

Shortly after, Andromeda reappeared. "She'll be OK, I think," she said. "She'd be fully recovered within a day if she was at St. Mungo's but I think she'll still fully recover of her own accord... eventually. She's weak and tired but she wants to see you... both of you."

So Lupin went back into the room. Tonks was propped up against a bunch of pillows. She looked pale and weak but strangely alive, fervently so. "Hey," he said, sliding into bed next to her with impressive grace given that he had never done such a thing before while holding a newborn – let alone a newborn as precious to him as his own son. "You did it," he said. He could never presume to take the credit, even if Teddy was genetically half his. He looked at his wife and he was full of love for both her and his son; he had never thought it possible to feel so deeply, even after he had loved Tonks enough to marry her despite his misgivings. "Thank you, _so much_," he said.

She smiled at him. He had never looked at her like that and instinct told her that whatever doubts he had had about being with her before had been obliterated with the family that they had created. Her fingers fluttered weakly and her gracefully shifted Teddy's weight to one arm and squeezed her hand with his free one. "He's perfect," he said. "Teddy's perfect."

"Teddy?"

"Sorry," he said contritely, feeling guilty because she had just as much right to name their son as he did – maybe more. She had overridden his fears about becoming a father, she had borne it when he had walked out of her, and she had forgiven him when he had come back. "It just felt natural. Theodore John Lupin. Teddy."

She smiled lovingly, tears of happiness in her eyes. He was right; it was perfect.

He nestled behind her so she could hold Teddy and he could wrap his arms around both of them. He nuzzled his face in Tonks's hair, feeling an intense bond to both of them and wondering how the hell he could ever have wanted to walk away from either of them.

* * *

Weather it was an extension of the natural bond that animals and children had, or there was some latent imprint of Lupin's werewolf psyche in Teddy's own, they didn't know, but Lupin always seemed to know when Teddy needed to be fed or changed before he started crying and woke his mother up. So Lupin took care of him at nights and Tonks during the day.

One night he was so engrossed with feeding Teddy and reciting a folk tale he knew by heart that he neither heard nor smelled Andromeda entering. "Gah!" he cried out when he saw his mother-in-law. "Merlin, Andy, is this your new plan? Scare me to death and get rid of me that way?"

Andromeda smiled half-grimly, half-sheepishly, if that were possible. "Must admit, I didn't think of that one."

He had dropped the bottle in his fright and Teddy started to whimper at the loss of his food. Andromeda picked it up. "Do you want to feed him?" he asked. He handed the baby over to Andromeda. It was in his nature to be possessive of Teddy, but he had to admit that Andromeda was good with him. Which relieved him somewhat, with his own parents and Ted dead; it was consolation to know that Teddy had _some_ family beyond his own parents.

Which reminded him of a distasteful subject that he had been reluctant to bring up, but the closer it got to the full moon, the less stalling time he had. "Andy, I need to ask you a favour," he blurted out. "It's to do with Teddy. I'm asking something heinous of you, I know, and if I could do it myself, I would, but –"

"He shows any sign of turning at the full moon and I'll break his neck," Andromeda said softly, but with a grim determination that reminded Lupin once more that she was the sister of Bellatrix Lestrange. "I know you turned out good, Remus, but I also know how hard it was to fight against you – er – basic nature, how painful it's been for you – " in every sense of the word, they both thought, physically, emotionally, mentally, "and how society's looked down on you because of it. It will be bad enough having you for a father – in society's eyes, I mean," she added, saying without saying it that she didn't think him being a werewolf at all impacted on his compassion as a human being or his ability as a father. "I won't put him through everything you've gone through. It will be more humane to end it. I know that sounds horrible, but –"

"I agree," Lupin said quietly. "I was eight. It was hard enough for me to understand, I won't put a baby through that. I won't have the first thing he knows be pain and this driving instinct to kill. That's not a life. But Dora can't know, at least not until after. She – she loves me to much, it's a weakness with her – sometimes," he admitted. "She'll never permit it."

Andromeda nodded slightly, and their eyes met in silent understanding of what was best for Teddy should he be a werewolf. "I don't sense anything, though," Lupin added. "I can sense others of my kind – far better than they can sense my humanity – and I think if he had a werewolf's cravings we'd know about it by now. I start getting stir-crazy after a few days without red meat and I _know_ why. By all rights, he should be wailing nonstop by now. He probably gets his taste for red meat from his mother," Lupin said ironically; Tonks infinitely preferred white meat.

* * *

But despite all his outward confidences that everything so far was telling them that Teddy was one-hundred-percent human, Lupin locked himself in his magically restrained room for the full moon terrified. He didn't regret his decision to have Teddy mercy-killed should he turn at the full moon – only that he couldn't do it himself – but in a few short weeks he had fallen hopelessly for his new son and the thought of losing him made him quail. _Please don't take Teddy from me, please don't take Teddy from me_, he repeated over and over to someone he wasn't even sure who it was – maybe that Christian God of Ted Tonks's. He chanted the words over and over to himself as he felt the change come over him. They were his last thoughts as he left his humanity behind...

... He woke up with a start, sensing, despite the windowless room, that it was the very earliest moment of daylight, the earliest point where he transformed back. He dressed quickly and paced around the room; the spell was designed to last longer that the night so, fully human, he walked around, growing increasingly frantic until the spell lifted for the day.

He dashed into Andromeda's bedroom, it not occurring to him for a second that maybe he should knock before he barged into his mother-in-law's room. "Hello to you too, Remus," Andromeda said dryly, rather civilised for the fact she hadn't slept a wink – and wouldn't have, even if she had wanted to. She had been too worried about her grandson.

"How –" he started to ask. Andromeda raised her hand in a _stop_ motion and, despite the fact that it was a simple human gesture and not a magical one that was designed to _actually_ stop him in his tracks, he stood still – and quiet.

"He's fine," she said. "I didn't take my eyes off him all night. You know, I think he's going to have your eyes. I think I can see flecks of green in them."

"You're not just saying that?" he asked frantically. He rushed over to his son's crib, where Teddy was sleeping peacefully, his tiny chest rising and falling rhythmically. As if sensing his father's presence, Teddy opened his eyes. Maybe it was true, maybe Andromeda's words had just put the suggestion in his mind, but he _did_ seem to have tiny flecks of green in his baby blue eyes. "Oh, God," he said, scooping Teddy up quickly and holding him against his chest so tightly that Teddy started to wail in protest. "Sorry, sweet," he whispered, loosening his grip into a comfortable hold and smothering his son's small head with kisses. "Oh, God," he said, and he felt as if the weight of the world had literally fallen from his shoulders. Who cared what happened in the war now that he knew his son wasn't like him?

"What's going on?" Tonks asked sleepily shuffling into the bedroom. "Remus, what are you doing in my mother's room?"

"Your husband was worrying himself sick over Teddy's first full moon," Andromeda said, making an effort to inject amusement in her voice despite her exhaustion – and her own worry. She exchanged a look with her son-in-law. They would never again speak of their plan should Teddy turn at the full moon, let alone let his mother know what they had been planning. "As you can see, he's perfectly fine – you would think the fact he's been perfectly happy on a diet of milk for the better part of a month while your husband gets grumpy if he doesn't consume a cow every week would be a good indication, but no, Remus has to work everything up so it's this massive crisis."

Tonks laughed. "Sounds exactly like him," she said. She walked over and kissed her husband tenderly on the cheek. Lupin wrapped his arm around her, Teddy in his other arm. He had never felt so happy and so at peace in his life.

"Harry, Ron and Hermione are at Shell Cottage – Bill and Fleur's place," Andromeda offered. She had known that for a few days, but didn't see any point in letting Lupin know until _after_ they knew once and for all what Teddy was; he would only be a downer on three already-stressed teenagers, worrying about his son's full moon. But now he had some good news to share in this dark world. "I thought you might like to go and share the good news."

"Can I have my wand back?" he asked hopefully.

She chuckled. "Nice try. You can take the Floo. You won't need your wand."

* * *

Needless to say, the residents of the crowded Shell Cottage got quite a fright when the fireplace sounded, even though they knew Lupin was coming. The goblin Griphook, for all his bravado, hid under the table as Bill called for the person to identify themselves."Is it I, Remus John Lupin," he called. "I am a werewolf, married to Nymphodora Tonks, and you, the Secret Keeper of Shell Cottage, have been conversing with my mother-in-law Andromeda Tonks." He fell over the threshold. "It's a boy! We named him Ted, after Dora's father. Theodore John Lupin. Teddy." He never got tired of saying his son's name.

Hermione shrieked. "What–? Tonks – Tonks has had the baby? "

"Yes, yes, she's had the baby! A few weeks ago." It occurred to everyone simultaneously that the full moon had just passed, and that the Lupins had been keeping the news to themselves until after the boy had passed his first full moon. "Completely human," Lupin gushed, his eyes shining.

"Congratulations!" Ron said. "Blimey – a baby!"

"Yes – yes – a boy." He strode over to Harry and hugged him tightly. "You'll be godfather?" he asked when he let the young man go.

"M – me?" Harry asked incredulously.

"You, yes, of course – Dora quite agrees, no-one better –"

"But – what about – her friends – family?" Harry asked, honoured and stunned by this offer.

"You mean Narcissa Malfoy?" Lupin asked with a smirk. "What muggle Tonks' there are that know of our existence and think we're freaks? Family's what you make it, Harry. We want _you_."

No-one knew better than Harry that family was what you made it. Breathless with the honour, he accepted.

Lupin and Harry talked privately a little later. "I know there's a battle coming, but I won't fight," he said. "Please don't think I'm a coward –"

"I don't –" Harry started to say, but Lupin cut him off.

"If it were just me, I wouldn't hesitate. We need every fighter we can get and if we lose, it's only a matter of time before they find out about Teddy. They won't care that he's human, they'll only care that he's _mine_. But if I fight, then Dora will fight, and she's in no fit state to look after Teddy unsupervised, let alone hold her own in a battle."

"She isn't recovering?" Harry asked.

"She will, eventually," Lupin said. "Andy was once _the_ rising star of St. Mungo's. Gave it up to be a full-time mother, so if there's any one person for Dora to have, it's Andy, but that's still not the same as having the expertise and facilities of St. Mungo's. But we don't dare take her there. It's under Ministry control, which means it's under Death Eater control. And additionally – well, you probably don't know this, but St. Mungo's was founded by the Blacks. They were never big on humanitarianism, it would all have been for show, but it made them look good, and the upshot is that the Head of St. Mungo's in an inherited position, whoever is considered the Head of the House of Black – and right now, following Sirius's death, that's Bellatrix." Harry shivered at the thought of Bellatrix Lestrange being the Head of St. Mungo's; no wonder Lupin and Andromeda were willing to take the risk of keeping Tonks at home then taking her to the hospital. "She _should_ be in hospital," Lupin said flatly. "She could be back to her old self in a few days with the right facilities. Andy's been kind enough not to say so, but I know cross-breed births are often complicated. She gets tired so easily. I don't like leaving her alone in case she misjudges how much strength she has and collapses – it's happened a few times. Her strength and reflexes are all off. I'm not worried about myself. My knowledge of the Dark Arts is as good as or better than most Death Eaters, and my reflexes and healing abilities are better than _all_ of them, 'cept maybe Greyback and his ilk. But Dora – Dora's in no position to fight a kitten, let alone a Death Eater, and if I go into battle, she'll follow me. So I won't fight. I'm sorry. I know that sounds cowardly to you, but –"

"Remus, it's the first decent thing I've heard you say all year," Harry said. "I understand that you want to put them first. I _want_ you to put them first. I just wish you could get her the care she should have."

There were tears of gratitude in Lupin's eyes that Harry understood him; the young man understood more things then he was given credit for. "Thank you," he said.

He turned to go. "One thing, Remus," Harry said, recalling what Lupin had said about the Head of St. Mungo's being an inherited position. "If Bellatrix dies –"

"Then for the first time in its existence, St. Mungo's would have the Head it deserves."

* * *

"It's over! _IT'S OVER! WE WON!_"

"Pomona, werewolf hearing, remember? You don't have to yell."

Sprout quietened, but she nonetheless rushed over the Lupin and hugged him tightly. "It's over! We won!" she repeated.

Lupin felt weak with relief. It was over. They had won. He still felt guilty for not fighting, though he knew that he'd done the right thing in staying with Tonks and Teddy. "What happened?" he choked out.

Sprout explained as briefly as she could. They had lost so many – including Fred Weasley – but the other side had lost more, including Bellatrix Lestrange, Lucius Malfoy ("Good," Lupin said viciously; if Andromeda's beloved husband was dead, then it was only fair that so was her sister's) and Voldemort himself. Harry had survived, as had all the teachers at Hogwarts – except for Snape. "It turned out he was on our side all along," Sprout said, a little reluctant to admit to such a thing, although Harry had insisted, and Harry was the last person on earth to say anything nice about Snape. "Where are Andromeda and Nymphodora?" Sprout asked. "And where's Theodore?" The boy was her first 'grandson', that was, the first grandchild born to one of her students; she felt a certain degree of kinship to him and was desperate to see him.

"Dora's sleeping. I'll go and get Andy and Teddy for you." _And my wand, too_, Lupin thought. Andromeda had never quite trusted him not to run off, and so had never given him his wand back; now, she had no reason to hold into it.

He knew that he was in shock that it was over, and with far less casualties than he had feared – although Ted and Fred were hardly people that wouldn't be missed – and Kingsley was Head of the Ministry of Magic. Kingsley had long been an advocate of good relations between non-humans, so his position could only improve from here. And with Bellatrix dead, the threat she posed against Tonks and Teddy was gone.

"Is it true?" Andromeda asked a few seconds later. "That crazy bitch known as my sister is dead?"

Sprout smiled ruefully. She had been teaching when both Bellatrix and Andromeda had gone through, and even before Ted had come along, there had been a lot of friction between the two sisters. "She's dead," Sprout confirmed. "Had this idea she was going to kill Ginny Weasley. Molly had a different idea."

"Sounds like someone else's mother," Lupin interjected. He decided it was in his best interest to keep his mouth shut when Andromeda shot him a filthy look.

"Hogwarts is no longer under Death Eater control?" Andromeda said, and Lupin knew where she was going with that question.

Sprout shook her head. "Whoever wasn't killed or captured has run off – they're hardly going to be hanging around such an establishment. I know what you're thinking, Andromeda. You are now the Head of St. Mungo's."

Andromeda nodded and stood up. "I want Dora there right now," she said firmly, looking eerily like her older sister with that regal dignity – only without the aura of insanity or evil.

"I agree. She shouldn't have had a child here, given..." Sprout trailed off, embarrassed, realising she was about to say something that could possibly injure Lupin's feelings.

"Given how notoriously difficult half-breed births are?" Lupin offered. "I was there when Teddy was born. She broke half a dozen bones in my hand and called me several names that I'm trying to forget. I pleaded with her not to have it. I know more than anyone else that she shouldn't have had him, least of all in these circumstances." He followed Andromeda into the bedroom he shared with Tonks. "Let me carry her," he said quietly; his strength was fair superior to his mother-in-laws. "Dora?" he asked gently. Tonks stirred in her sleep; she slept a lot these days, rest being one of the few treatments available to her. "Dora, it's over. We've won, Voldemort is dead." He decided to let Andromeda tell her later about Lucius, sure that Tonks would take the same vicious pleasure out of it as they had. "We're taking you to St. Mungo's."

"It's mum's now," she said drowsily.

"Yeah." While not technically true – Andromeda was the Head Administrator, not the _owner_ of St. Mungo's, but she had the power to make sweeping decisions – and concentrate whatever expertise and resources she saw fit on her recovering daughter.

Less than fifteen minutes later. Andromeda was marching through the halls of St. Mungo's as regally as if she _did_ own it. "For those of you who aren't aware, my name is Andromeda Tonks," she declared as she walked, her presence and commanding tone guaranteeing that people stopped to listen – and pass the word on. "Upon my sister Bellatrix's death, I am the Head Administrator of this hospital. I am trained as a Healer and have no intention of administrating from a distance. My policies will be far different to that of my sister's. Anyone who doesn't like this is free to leave."

She was met with applause from Healers and Nursing Matrons who had chafed under the stifling policies of Bellatrix Lestrange and her Death Eater cohorts, who had had narrow-minded views about who was eligible for treatment and who wasn't. Andromeda Tonks _had_ to be an improvement on Bellatrix.

* * *

Lupin, who normally had superhuman smell, hearing and sense about the presence of others, needed to be addressed three times before he realised that McGonagall was in his room. "Sorry," he said. "I was... thinking."

"I can understand that," she said dryly. She looked at Teddy, cradled in his arms. He had been so lost in his wife and young son that McGonagall had been content to be ignored. Despite his wife's long recovery – now aided with the stronger restorative potion to be had, which had knocked her into a deep sleep but was speeding along her recovery – he had never looked so happy, so peaceful. He was no doubt the happiest he had been since he had been bitten. "Can I hold him?" she asked.

Lupin looked reluctant – after all, McGonagall had never had children of her own, so how should she know how to hold one? – But quashed his reluctances. McGonagall had been his Head of House, and since his own mother had died when he had been relatively young, she was the closest he _had_ to a mother figure. He couldn't just spit in her face like that by refusing to let her handle his baby.

"He's beautiful," McGonagall said approvingly, as if Lupin – and herself by extension – was personally responsible for such a thing. "He has your eyes."

"That's pretty much all he has of mine," Lupin said, and there was a touch of relief in his voice as well as pride, because it was clear that Teddy had inherited some of his mother's metamorphmagus skills – but none of his father's lycanthropy.

"Theodore John Lupin," McGonagall said. "It's a strong name, just what I'd expect for a boy with such a strong lineage."

"I'm only a half-blood half-breed –" Lupin started to say. McGonagall waved away his objections.

"If anything has been learnt, Remus, it's that blood status – _human_ status – counts for nothing against our capacity to love, be brave, intelligent, loyal. Andromeda married a muggle-born and he was a far greater man – and far greater wizard – than either of the men –" McGonagall spoke the word with distaste, as if it was a title she was reluctant to afford to either Malfoy or Lestrange, "– her sisters married. _You_ are far greater man and wizard than either of them. That's why I'm asking you to come back to Hogwarts."

For a second, Lupin thought McGonagall was pulling his leg, or he had completely misheard her. It was so easy to fantasise about the possibilities of a future without Voldemort that maybe the fantasy of teaching again had crept into his thoughts. "I'm sorry?" he asked.

"I'd like you to come back to Hogwarts," she repeated, as if not the least bit surprise that he wouldn't quite have heard her the first time. "You were the best DADA teacher the students had. We need someone of your abilities and open-mindedness now more than ever."

"I was asked to resign before, Minerva," he reminded her quietly. "_Twice_."

"The first time because you were caught making out with a student – a student you have since married and had a child with, a student that, by all accounts, you couldn't get over – and she couldn't get over you – no matter how much time and distance the two of you put between you. Those aren't the actions of a man who trawls for impressionable young women to corrupt, they're the actions of a man who fell for _one_ woman and was only really happy when he married her. And as far as you being a werewolf goes – if that bothers anyone, then I don't want them in my school. You're a terrific teacher, Remus, and you have your condition under control – well, as much control as you can manage. And you have huge responsibilities now – I doubt you will let an oversight like forgetting your Wolfsbane to happen again. Please, Remus, think about what you can do – all those students that you can feel with productive, fair-minded skills and knowledge. Not to mention how well you'll be able to provide for your wife and son," she added shrewdly.

"That's not fair," he responded good-naturedly. He had always felt bad about having to rely on Ted and Andromeda's charity; now he was being offered the opportunity to be able to provide for Tonks and Teddy. "You really think it won't be an issue, me being a werewolf?" he asked tentatively.

"Of course it will be an issue," McGonagall said bluntly. "But it's not an insurmountable one. Think about what you could be doing for all Dark Creatures, living openly, happily married, raising a child, doing so much for the community – think about the awareness you can raise."

_That_ was too much for him to keep saying no to. How could he? Not only could he provide for his wife and child, but he could be out there, living productively, contributing to the magical community, making people aware that he could be who he was and still be a husband, father and pillar of the community. "OK," he agreed.

* * *

"Remus?"

"I'm here, love." Lupin took his wife's hand in his. "How are you feeling?"

"Strong."

"I should hope so. You've been dead to the world for the last three days. That was one powerful restorative potion."

"Where's Teddy?"

Lupin got him and placed the boy in his wife's arms. For a few minutes, he watched them together in complete silence, overcome by the power of his love for him and the reality that they were his. "Dora, I know it was awful for you, so if you don't want another one, I'll understand, but... I do. I never saw myself as a father, but now that I have Teddy – I can't imagine _not_ being a dad. I want another one. Several, actually. I want to be able to rival the Weasleys."

Tonks's eyes sparkled with happiness, because it was exactly what she had wanted – difficult childbirth be damned – but she had been scared that, since Teddy had been conceived by deception, her husband would redouble his efforts to deny another conception. "Yes," she agreed happily

He told her about his position at Hogwarts and she was so excited. "I have some other news for you," he said. "Hermione Granger is taking the Muggle Studies position – Merlin knows, she has to be the only person brave enough and lacking in superstition to take it after what happened to be Quirrel and Burbage – and Neville is to be Sprout's apprentice the year after next. Seems Minerva wanted him for _next_ year but he's hooked up with a certain Ravenclaw and she well remembers the _last_ time a Professor was involved with a student."

She smiled adoringly at that. "See, Remus, Minerva was right about you all along – you're a brilliant Professor, and in just a year you inspired _two_ of your students to follow in your footsteps."

He leaned over to kiss her on the forehead, careful not to disturb their son in her arms. He could scarcely believe his luck, how well things had come together for him – he would never have thought this all possible when he had first been bitten more than thirty years ago. "I love you," he said simply.

**Thanks for reading, everyone! I don't know when I'll write another L/T fic - I've become something of a L/Ginny shipper lately - but thanks for reading all my fics and all you feedback. XXOO harrypotterfangirl.**


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